What I Really Feel

             is the breath of winter

             inhaling the warm sighs of summer,

             its final hot gasps knowing it will not

             be resuscitated.

What I really feel

             are the secrets of autumn already curling

             the sycamore leaves to dark, ruddy ears

             catching words riding morning to night,

             a lilting air in registers no human can

             hear.

                        the dog suddenly raises its head,

             momentarily weighs the gravity, lays

             back. it bears no call to action. no need

             to growl or bark.

What I really feel

             is the final chill dropped by night. its end

             and the beginning. unless it’s the other

             way around.

                                       I turn left side to right. even

             more asleep than awake the sticky film of

             perspiration causes discomfort. even less

             awake than asleep, I listen for cues, for the

             prompt from the foot of the stage to lead

             me stumbling, stuttering into the scene.

                                                                                       the

             sky remains dark. I feel it. I keep my eyes

             closed.

                            a wave breaks. I tumble with its

             soft surge, gently back and forth below the

             harbor buoys.

What I really feel

             are the gaps and pauses left by

             the absence of songs. birds choose to sleep

             shaking or shuddering as they cling to

             slim branches.

                                           a soft sound turns

             like a golden seed deep in their throats

             passing into the cool dark air as a sigh.

             if birds dream.

What I really feel

             is the insistent pressure, a crushing

             g-force as I reach escape velocity. relentless

             gravity holds me. its tendrils wrap limbs and

             trunk, penetrate muscles and tissue, refusing

             to release, even as this paradigm collapses,

             even as failed love tightens its desperate grip.

             even as the world careens and

             spirals through einstein’s formulae along a

             helix yet to be imagined.

What I really feel

             is deep isolation held by tumbling

             comets as they search the Kuiper for

             the icy trail they left along their

             glimmering apogees where they finished

             fleeing, where they began their tight arcs

             along wordless paths back to a star that,

             even if they could squint and search the star-

             spangled vastness, they would not and

             could not see.

What I really feel

             is love has its own gravity, is the center of

             its own system. love demands interaction.

             proximity.

                                   we orbit each other, close like

             infantile mercury. distant like variable

             comets going and coming. elliptic and

             ecliptic far above and beyond zodiacal

             prediction.

                                    we dance like tornadoes, pulling

             up everything near, pulling in and finally

             flinging away. we grow within grand

             patterns like the ultimately unpredictable

             weather.

                                we find each other like electrons

             seeking valence, seeking stability, bonding

             atoms to molecules.

What I really feel

             is the memory of a long ago kiss that

             flushed my cheeks and calmed my soul.

             I thought gravity would hold us

             forever in orbits spiraling through the

             universe never expecting the crushing

             affect of escape velocity.

 

 

18sep16