Love Poem: The Breathing Fog of May and the Insistence of Wednesday's Sun.
Jeanmarie Marchese Avatar
Written by: Jeanmarie Marchese

The Breathing Fog of May and the Insistence of Wednesday's Sun.

It's...


irrelevant


we're two stories, picture books rubbed raw and torn pages, he's


ripped


up the middle, down the lines of his face on the left and his right ear


dangles


over my toes when midnight falls, I watch him, inconspicuous, listen to my sleep.



I'm breathing, I'm attacked by May and I used to know lavender beneath the fog, I used to
know dawn, I blanketed myself with scratches and wrote love letters to April when I missed
the rain...


but now I write letters to him, hoping, somewhere, my handwriting can tattoo his skin.



He...


feels...


sometimes, I think it's love, that's what he's termed this undiluted destruction of me and
it's a shame I didn't stain him, it's a shame my blood doesn't laugh at him from his
palms, it's a



shame



I don't crawl over him like fleas at midnight, biting, itching and tearing him to shreds...


it's a shame I still make him smile.



I know the shape of Tuesday evening, she turns sideways beneath the moon, and my thighs
become blue with memories and reflections but I leave the window open to confuse tomorrow


I crack the glass and pray I don't bleed, I...


slice through sunlight, I'm


tired


and he's sleeping, his eyes are always closed....


and I whisper to Wednesday to steal his eyelashes, I cry to April to blow them to me and I
promised, I promised Thursday I'd make these wishes....



but I don't know



how to collect.




He's ineffectual as long as I'm cold, he's problematic and I sweat, swatting at headlights
and curling under blankets, I'm trying to fool myself but



my eyes don't close...


and I've spit on last January, indignant in her youth, she'll never hear the screaming
pain of forgiveness...


and my mouth


won't


close, my teeth won't crash and creek and grind him down...


not this close to May, anyway, not this close to


Wednesday.