Love Poem: April Confusion
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Written by: Allison Ballard

April Confusion

April happens
One out of twelve chances
That it has to come each year
And it always seems
To happen out
This way

The vast chance 
The ocean has 
To roll out over me
Is never unwasted,

And it finds my raw, used up hands
Swelling like cold water
Rising in distention
And falling like an exhale
In the deep

Puerto Rico delivers this to me
Upon anguishing fingertips
And I follow my love in the alley

There we share confusing breaths
That plunge us like thorns 
Into ourselves
Making us feel foreign

April finds me possessed 
In the reflection of my new heart’s smile
And whispering prayers 
That he might love me
And prayers that this drug
Won’t snuff me
As I’m trying to figure out
Why I want him this bad

But those pleas can’t help
But fall away 
As our smoky lungs make us
 tumble into
a dream, that food or drink
Can try to bear us through

My body becomes a claustrophobic cave
It’s hard to see, and it’s hard to breathe
And It’s hard not being terrified

Because my mouth is definitely stuck together
And my butter skin is slipping
And together we slip, we’re tripping
Into some oblivion
And I’m Hoping it might soon be over

Maybe then I’ll tell you
That I love you
And that I don’t want you to leave me
And that maybe 
You can save this life I’m risking
For a confusing moment next to you

God shaped my hollow heart 
To hope to not be empty

And yet April falls upon me
As indifferently as the weather tempers trees
Tearing branches with green spread leaves
Making anything that can be made to be 
From a loveless sun, a callous sea

This is how April’s tide tosses
its sleepy back to me

Though my bare chest breaks
As the dark night sways
There’s no more swaying I can do
I look to you.

Because, my star
My constant Spanish song
As long as I am strong
I will fall for those I love 

Even when
There are only empty alleys
To catch me