Firestar
Laurel Barton
I don't like the way our story goes but I'll write it down despite it all:
(It's not like we're trying
(It's not like we should be))
We're staring at the sun –
we're radiant
we love with the gentlest consumption
Now –
I stare at you
and there isn't a name for what you are.
Let's call you holy.
Let's call you whole.
I can't understand what it would mean
to be that good
to be that good
to be that full of light
My god, are you beautiful
and my god, are you terrifying
Silently –
there's a girl screaming
inside the safe room in the house I hold within myself
the black box
Please
don't leave me alone with my hands
You hold stars to your chest like glass and you never see how they burn you up in the place
where it matters.
You become your choices.
A world crumpled.
what a life
what a life
this is what loneliness looks like
like looking through golden fingers
backlit with daybreak
and coming up
empty
Now –
CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS LIFE?
your body made of sunbursts
glass skin and paper hearts
Your body caving in on itself for heat, for touch, and I'm lying naked beside you wanting.
A hopelessness that doesn't win
Imagine that.
I don't know what to call you
but it isn't brave
I don't know what bravery looks like
but it isn't me
"Five AM and Falling In Love"
ass-up and his fresh fingers make it hard to scratch these words on the page
and maybe if I move enough
maybe if I scream and bleed enough
I'll know myself as a poet
and not some half-baked kid convincing god
he's still something to believe in
too distracted by coffee stains and newer stains
spreading like spilt milk down the sides of these softs sheets
and I'm star-struck love-struck
rammed in the throat by shock dragging cold nails up my back
all goosepimpled flesh pinned tight
and nothing short of promise under that ugly ceiling staring back at us
and I'm watching you walk away from the base of the stairs
and you're staring at me like my mother on Sunday morning
my teeth are falling out like a string of broken pearls
and nothing short of promise in the hard pain of knees dropped down on concrete
tell me:
When did you become a you?
When did I stamp your life onto this page?
What makes you permanent?
You.
A pool of moonburst drowning me.
You,
with your crinkled black-eyed smile.
Well I'm choking down air trying to shape your name out of my mouth
while you're choking on me.
babylon is still young and
we're still trying to find ourselves but
we're looking in all the wrong places
and we're flying down the highway flooded full with promise
and we're scratching light into our bodies trying to connect
But it's not violent. We're not violent.
I don't know how this story ends but I know how we will write it --
with some certain kind of softness.
Laurel Barton
I don't like the way our story goes but I'll write it down despite it all:
(It's not like we're trying
(It's not like we should be))
We're staring at the sun –
we're radiant
we love with the gentlest consumption
Now –
I stare at you
and there isn't a name for what you are.
Let's call you holy.
Let's call you whole.
I can't understand what it would mean
to be that good
to be that good
to be that full of light
My god, are you beautiful
and my god, are you terrifying
Silently –
there's a girl screaming
inside the safe room in the house I hold within myself
the black box
Please
don't leave me alone with my hands
You hold stars to your chest like glass and you never see how they burn you up in the place
where it matters.
You become your choices.
A world crumpled.
what a life
what a life
this is what loneliness looks like
like looking through golden fingers
backlit with daybreak
and coming up
empty
Now –
CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS LIFE?
your body made of sunbursts
glass skin and paper hearts
Your body caving in on itself for heat, for touch, and I'm lying naked beside you wanting.
A hopelessness that doesn't win
Imagine that.
I don't know what to call you
but it isn't brave
I don't know what bravery looks like
but it isn't me
"Five AM and Falling In Love"
ass-up and his fresh fingers make it hard to scratch these words on the page
and maybe if I move enough
maybe if I scream and bleed enough
I'll know myself as a poet
and not some half-baked kid convincing god
he's still something to believe in
too distracted by coffee stains and newer stains
spreading like spilt milk down the sides of these softs sheets
and I'm star-struck love-struck
rammed in the throat by shock dragging cold nails up my back
all goosepimpled flesh pinned tight
and nothing short of promise under that ugly ceiling staring back at us
and I'm watching you walk away from the base of the stairs
and you're staring at me like my mother on Sunday morning
my teeth are falling out like a string of broken pearls
and nothing short of promise in the hard pain of knees dropped down on concrete
tell me:
When did you become a you?
When did I stamp your life onto this page?
What makes you permanent?
You.
A pool of moonburst drowning me.
You,
with your crinkled black-eyed smile.
Well I'm choking down air trying to shape your name out of my mouth
while you're choking on me.
babylon is still young and
we're still trying to find ourselves but
we're looking in all the wrong places
and we're flying down the highway flooded full with promise
and we're scratching light into our bodies trying to connect
But it's not violent. We're not violent.
I don't know how this story ends but I know how we will write it --
with some certain kind of softness.