The element
What is the element of love
that feels like a candy wrapper in your mouth,
so fused with the chocolate,
you swallow without concern?
What is it, you have, that tastes like that
when I kiss you in my thoughts?
What is that they say about pheromones
like perfume?
Is that what wears your clothes
like diluted oxygen
while I am searching your eyes for breath?
Or is it what makes me think about parking
before I leave you with my heart in scraps of foil
like an S.O.S?
You linger,
without wanting to be thought of.
You haunt me without chains or sheets
and yet I whimper inside myself
when I conjure your face with free time and distortions of will.
I bet you did not know,
you could be so habit forming like a drug.
You would say you’re just a girl,
if you ever heard yourself described in one of my poems.
At the crux of my disorder,
I know that I am an addict
and you are just an element…
but at the front,
I am a lecherous fiend,
void of hope or reason.
I suffer from tunnel vision
when I’m trying to try on someone else.
You are a vortex I’m passing through
and I don’t really matter
but that does not dissuade me
when I think about love
and try to get it from you.
You are my dealer
and I cannot just start putting things up my nose
when I am so used to this needle,
filled with the last smile I broke down into a liquid.
That’s right…
the element remains elusive
because it shifts with your generosity.
A smile, a look, a pause or a comment…
you squeezed my arm.
I remember now, you squeezed my arm
and then I drove away with crumpled wrappers in your driveway
and my heart melting in your mouth,
on the house.
