You are a mammal I remind him a vertibrate and like all this class of beings an unexpected message smile illuminated screen sends your system into ancient frenzy So if you can bear that rush and push and the hard-wired clinging of your whole being click on But if you, like me cannot balance that taught line put it down, put it down
Author: Elizabeth Maynard
Last Batch
The union of butter and sugar: divine Last night, sleepless I married them gently over a low flame This is the last batch My next sleeplessness will be consumed by your tongue tracing the slow curve of my spine
Jiashan Station
The last time you kissed me was as the train pulled into Jiashan Station You pointed to your mouth pulled down your mask and beckoned me to your lips And then I stepped out of the car as you rushed on I, careful not to look back so you could not see how much more I wanted
Paper
On paper we make every sense But paper has neither pulse nor breath It will not fog a mirror or lift a life Please put a match to me Let's burn our little world down
May I?
When I am spun up and around all elbows and missteps stammering sighing heavily into myself Absolute heaven is your arm outstretched and drawing my cheek to your chest May I? you whisper And I yield Yes.
Take Heart
I speak today at the insistence of angels who shout: Take heart! Take heart! Take heart, weary traveler soul-bruised lonely and afraid Take heart! Take heart! All around you and within the light grows the tides flow the bud is forced into riotous bloom Take heart
Fire
When the house burns down take nothing with you but the hand of your child and your own beating heart
Regression to the Mean
In statistics we see extreme scores head to the middle over time the depression grows lighter anxiety more bearable poor sleep improves slights are forgiven What was once so powerful mellows and folds into itself But I grieve this, too because I know that this all of this great tingling love it, too will regress to the mean
Idiots
We might both be idiots Here is this bright thing in front of us and between that could be so good So far what we have come up with are reasons the timing is wrong things others might say and how cautious we should be about appearances We even held a whole conversation today about the ones who got away oblivious to this precious thing Here. Now.
Here you are
Here you are shaking with rage and demanding apologies from those you wounded when it was you who was so deeply in the wrong It was your words launching out to dismantle each of us breath by breath finding fault and sealing your pyrrhic victory
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