A voice I haven’t heard
all captured in letters
you taped together

each of the I love yous
you said: I do, too, and also you

How he paraded out
for the time in this life
when he’s supposed to be getting a wife–
to prove he was always the one who was right
and all that he does, he intends
even the snakes that emerged
from his monstrous and stony head

But I felt like nothing had changed,
it was subtly strange;
truth be told, it did not faze me at all:
I was ready to field your call

Allison,
I repeat
I meant what I said
when I asked you never to leave;
you were sweet
but not sugarcoated,
you gave me your firm guarantee

And what’s in a name?
I haven’t thought that way
since making ours the same

when you awoke from a dream
to say it sounded like music
how I had forgotten to breathe

You are you,
I am me,
and he’s an expression that neither of us seem to need

I believe
the matter is settled;
the project is nearly complete

you don’t need to change for me
but if you change

i thank the stars that set you free

you rearranged
the way they told you not to be

i thank the heart that set you free

your hair hangs like golden hoops
and how i wish i could leap through:
a spinning, twisting acrobat
falling
in a perfect loop

beginning something difficult
with everything to prove:
inarticulable intent,

embedded in a poem
so i guarantee that
one day you’ll understand exactly what i meant

i’m somersaulting:
you remain content
in how quietly you echo
what i said

you don’t need to change for me
but if you change

there’s nothing that will change for me

then we exchanged
a meaning only we could see

we rearranged
the way they told us not to be:
it’s not so strange

holy shit, i love you
you idiot, you dummy, you tender thing
the way time passes between us
like throwing flowers,
it showers us in sunlight
and forms a floral crown

you grin, i sigh;
light shines jade,
reflecting off your eyes

you do not mind
anybody’s envy
when you do not know them
and you are not intending to

i moved too fast
at first, when i was used to that
but with all this waiting
i turned into a scale wing

you see the future,
you’re scared that something always ends
i tell you softly:
not if you’re determined

_{^{/obj/item/love/mine
name = “Something Rare”
desc = “It emanates a strange but radiant light. Maybe you should reconsider?”}}

you say you know me
however, i disagree
i have not always been a truthful person

respectfully, and if no one minds me
i purposely put all of that behind me
the redlining of pointless rewinding
and hapless crying

half-hearted, committed to misunderstanding,
i’m planting my feet and sticking the landing
that man could be right if he weren’t so demanding—
he hates my new name? i’m sorry, it’s branding

but i’m handing in my distance;
better, turning in my pride, and
trading in the notions that i can’t abide

i no longer care if he says i lied
i am not even the one that he cast aside

i told you someday
i’ll tell you all you need to know
but between us,
words lately flow slowly,
sticky sap, sweet and gold in the moment
i’ve chosen
to speak through atonement;

you give me your actions,
i give you my progress

if you are acceptance,
then i am intention

and this is ascension
a perfect dimension
and our hearts are just something
we don’t need to mention

since you’ve been growing
your hair out,

i’ve sewn you into my sleeve

the summer has already passed
turning on its heavy spokes,
and nothing seems to have faded
the way they professed to hope

so who’s to say this isn’t the best result?
i used to lament
this deep space,
like a meteor
spinning endlessly ablaze
to macerate the globe

then from the rubble
i saw you peeking out,

green-eyed, soft-spoken

ricocheting like a water bolt
i admit i put you on a pedestal
i was skeptical
to lay eyes on such a spectacle

but i expect it will stay respectable

(hello, it’s me:
inevitable, incontestable omnisexual)

and by the way, you are aware
–yes–
that i have loved you
longer than i’ve known you?

Allison has this way
of making the sun come up
in the deep southern sky

like the rose before the rain,

she’s bound to change,
I’m bound to reify

she signs the page;
admittedly I am terrified
because I don’t know why

she would shine this precious light 

in this spring of life, the warm sun bright 
and cascading down,
it shatters and scatters all around;

I vow I will treat her right
from now ‘til the end of time

and

Allison has a remarkable smile
that no one’s ever seen;
it’s a rare, rare thing

and I think
if she would appear in my dream,
I could get her to speak
and concede—
she’ll grant that expression to me

like the novels we read,
but this will be realer
I’ll write a reminder

It’s never been clearer
It’s never been kinder

in this spring of life, the warm sun bright 
and cascading down,
it shatters and scatters all around

and I vow I will treat her right
from now til the end of time

you were in my dream last night
the foggy light a silver sheen
you lifted up
your amber glass
said I’ll confess to everything

beyond your eyes i saw a look
i’ve only seen it once before
you did enough,
i dare not ask
i lay my heart out on the floor

“it’s best to be direct in love,” you said
with just a hint of fear
i memorized the whole exchange
i have to say i want you here

i have to say i need your strength
i have to say i hold you dear
not half the way i used to shrink
i’ve chosen now to persevere

so take your time, and take this down:
life has been strange, but i‘ve got you now
as long as you want me, i will be around

will you still feel the same in a year or ten?
tell me, what will you think of my actions then?
i wish i could express the canard in my chest
it’s so hard to convey
but so hard to repress

and i can only dream of days
where things have changed,
we’re rearranged
you’re hesitant to share with me
but that’s okay, i feel the same

“it’s best to be direct in love,” you said
with just a hint of fear
i know what you were asking me
i have to say i want you here

you were not one
to speak, so i spoke
for us
the solution was always slower

late bloomers,
brought from fall to summer
on the backs of wild rumors,
the sun we’re lying under
cracks beneath the thunder

and slides closer,

I ask if you remember
you tremble like a clover
mumbling over and over

I take your hand,
you give me a look I don’t quite understand

I breathe your name,
you draw constellations of us in the rain

How much I want to know you
How much I want to know you
To show you, bestow you,
and to protect from what you go through

here’s a heart
getting truer every day:
a mind fuck
to wind up
in the exact right place

tendered by commendable silence
intended violence of love
i take this heart-glass and smash it
“in case of emergency,” my ass
i’ll ask it
and dependent on the answer
perhaps task it

i
nearly
passed it

if i had not
been looking

you state
that
something about this radiates

i do not believe in fate
but i remember
every
important
date

late in late september
or was it january? wait

how do we count? i mean
what is counting even about?
we tried to reach out,
uncertain if it was allowed

i’m certainly proud;
i’m certainly destined to stand and speak out
but the music is loud
and when i focus
i only see you in the crowd

what should i do now?
all of the neighbors are starting to gather around
i’d rather go down
i’d rather be no one forever than lose what i’ve already found

this is a vow

and fuck anybody who doubts
it is an emergency now
i’m feeling you fervently now
i’m loving you urgently now

so
fourteen inches separates
that i would glance into your
and you know that, right?

we have become notorious for unfinished sentences
what trickles out of mouths
is the stuttering stream of consciousness
down which
affection swims
and bubbles to the surface

i don’t know the name of this
but i’d like to buy in

to see you shine so pure
i surely would never worry about it again

and it’s not my first time playing
still luck is my unreliable friend

oh and i
i do think they’re listening in
i do know they’d
never understand

but

i see it written in my eyes and my mouth
golden light blinding
when the riddles come out