the slow art of breathing bitter

Shadow of Shades

I've grown with years, darling.

It's February, and I ain't missing you as I did.

A warm whisper of our late-night secrets,

and a long sip of champagne.

The winter bliss seeps in the early summer warmth.

I have always been the dark liquid that you used to pour 

down into your thirsty throat.

I'd burn it—crimson in heat.

The fallen meteors cracked your throat

with the igniting wine.

The pine trees are dipped in crisp, white snow;

a tedious winter of blazing memories.

I live under the shadow of shades:

Crimson, gold, azure, violet.

My arms are blistered with clogged desires

and I colored yours with blossoming promises

in daffodil yellow.

The promise of wintergreen,

reveling in the summer rush.

We used to sit under the tree for hours

and smell moth-eaten books and little pink flowers.

Exploding euphoria — transcended from ivory hills

and sea-green laughter.

We used to light stars in rhapsody

and stay awake for nights, painting and kissing. 

I don't quite remember anything now except your red lips.

But I can name all the shades that lingered

in the shadow, we lived.

Late winter afternoons were caught between the spaces

of missing lyrics by dead poets and sweet nightmares.

Nothing could touch our wasted hearts,

not even death.

Our youth limbs still crave

the last fevered touch in our

fomented and cheap romance —

Before we fall apart in numbed arteries.

Oh, darling, it ain't just love

cascading in the street lights from the charcoal sky.

It's a delusion of lie and living,

wants and needs — dead leaves of autumn.

I'm wearing your blue cashmere,

and you are wearing mine.

We can smell the dark champagne, 

your lemongrass warmth, and darkened rain.

I wake up with my heart twisted in knots

and the afterglow falling behind my curtain.

The falling stars dance barefoot in the wailing sky;

it's never too late for us

when pain is stitched with ecstasy.

We're wide awake for this to end

as a new love story, no more under the shadow of afterglow.

Now, under the lights of colors—

Vampire red, sunflower yellow, and magenta lovers.

The rest — splintering away before this world ends.

It's just another night

with no more shades, no more euphoria.

Webbed daylight and ringing smoke,

crawling like mundane loverboys.

I want one last dream about you

before fading into our final beginnings.

-we survived in the slipping kindness of melancholia.

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