Mistranslations

The last words exchanged

Came quietly through the hotel window

I mistook the chill for the air conditioner

Until I realized the machine has been broken.

Soft sentences coming from a hardened heart

A contrast between soul and spirit,

And yet, they both manage to come together

Clashing violently in my core

As I try to make sense of your silence.

 

Maybe it’s not for me to know,

A question I posed but the answer

Lies elsewhere

In the pencils on your desk

In the bottles of liquor scattered on my sheets

Or, in the clouds forming in our eyes

Draining our vision

Converting it into venom

A poison planted in our retinas,

Changing baby blue irises to virulent blacks

Unable to see what was in front of us,

Seeking the light instead of holding tight.

 

I know, I know,

You needed this

But, I…

Needed you.

Here we now sit,

Communicating with hands rather than lips

The carpal tunnel setting in,

Wrists popping and thumbs tightening

As thoughts are converted to text

That neither of us can translate.

Remembered Strangers, Forgotten Lovers

There will come a day, months after that day

When the inevitable will happen

And your position in my life will become both past and future

I’ll see a girl who looks like you, and she’ll smile like you did at my jokes

And her eyes will tell me all the things you used to whisper to me.

We’ll probably date for awhile,

At first to make you hurt then long enough for me to start seeing you in her reflection

To blend our memories together with hers

How parasitic we really are