trace the shadow

[artolmaeus]

run your fingers over my scars, for I earned every one

crash into the windshield by the hands of love

when love gets tested past its limits, when your end is the answer

to some equation of entrapment, and be held in the arms

of a kind faced angel, and see that infant body covered in glass

lifeless, forms, and see her face, for once, when the fear subsides

and the guilt sets in, and wonder, why they let me back into this

feel every crack in my skull, and imagine your energy can go into my skin

like some sonogram and see that untouched part of me

and for all I can give or surrender, please hold that tightly

so that you never forget, how much, dear God, how much I want you to see me

in all the unhidden things I can never talk about, because I have never understood them

feel the cold when I was laid unclothed in a February snow,

and God moved neighbors, because I surely know I have watchers over me

but they are the silent audience I can never connect with

for this moment when my eyes first saw you, and in all the things you were lacking

it was the purity of your smile and all the things you were trying to reach

and this whole thing, at least, me, is not so damned complicated,

of all the hands that have kept me here and healed me and carried me

when I was between the here and there and anywhere

it is your hands, those hands in this atmosphere as long as I breath

brings everything out past this patched and fortified shell

because at times, it becomes a monster protecting its most precious part

and it is there, and in those eyes, I can see that face I cannot see with mine

and, yes, isn't it really simple, as I have seen all the things of the stardust that made you

and I see your shine, see mine, take a moment

for all I want, is just to stop being unwanted, unknown

I was carried across the surface of the sun, and looked into the face of God

and even He put me back here, and it was love in a most suffrable reason

oh, I have a hard time saying these words with my breath

how many times, I was smothered, and I watched a face go from anger

to guilt to shame, to madness and the reason for some sense of duty by name

and another paint by number picture goes on the wall, in some way it ordered her

for all the ways she was broken, and she never was put back, only in torn parts, she continued

and tried, to mend the slashes with transparent tape, but nothing hides scars

when you share the same blood and madness,

but what was done to me, did not make me, but how I have reacted

and what I can communicate comes loudly and wrongly, and now, in my private silence

I scream to you 1,000 miles deep where no corpuscle can reach, nor oxygen needed

but how it wants to breath, to love you,

what a strange thing, the things we really need, want the most, however you label it

we are powerless to make, I have cherished the paths and trails of every part of you

and I cannot see it, as you do, because, you are more beautiful than the wrapper

oh, yes, the gift is inside, how many coats we have to shed to get to the well worn wood

and then, to the center cells that are never exposed to harm, weather or joy

like the germ in a seed that needs all that surrounds it to die before it can live

how long we have been, and we paint these numbers with the little plastic things holding the paint

and carefully we apply diligently within the lines, no, feel these lines where the skin left a milestone

it was the first thing I did with you, and in silence, I have waited, and you have endured

so then, all the pretenses of this thing we think life is, you know, what you see, how we act

maybe laugh and cry, and we continue, and press on, and sometimes put up the blinders

but let's look at it all, together, because once that story is read and known

we don't keep repeating stories that have all too long ago ended, for that is the key to entropy

and we are not the constant gardener of such things, there's time to change

we don't have to hang from the crescent tip of the moon, when it is only a reflection of the sun

we can bathe in the light, as monsters we can dance until something falls to our heels

and we become naked, differently than all the times we have been naked but for some short lived reason

and laugh at the joke, and the lesson the creator is all but too wrapped in it with us

because, you cannot run from being broken, torn or even what seems like lonliness

or hurt or whatever forces mold and forge some definition that we believe forged us

or perhaps makes our coarse iron into steel as if we ever needed to be tempered

oh God please, hear me and lets rust together, and let the rain fall on us more

and avoid nothing,

dance with me, right now, let's spend it all on priority mail this message that we want to save

somehow for a third class rate, and not worry about the money,

run your hands across this dying body, and as I do you, never be afraid of the story that is

as the story that is yet to be, is ours to write, no matter unstable or worn our hands may be

your touch is the medicine for being unwanted or uneeded, perhaps as little as teaspoon

as there is not enough cod liver oil to compare to that, while we are in this atmosphere

let's give it company with the sounds of us just allowing everything

to be free of angers and hurt that never had to be as somewhere, it was all for understanding

but no one ever tells us and we don't trust the path we have yet to make,

but all well worn paths lead to a cliff, and we have to find that cliff some other way

and do our best to reach it fast, as what falls lets us rise in all the things that are left that can rise

sometimes the best things are faded, overgrown or yet to be known

that, all of that, I want to sift and pan for even a molecule of that

with you