The woman and the snake eater

For many years of my life I loved him,

brilliant man with soft finger tips

whose name meant happy in a foreign tongue.

We shared mutual friends, mutual dreams and

infrequently, mutual beds.

By chance, I would attach

him deeper and deeper to my heart's desires.

After all, he would make an excellent provider, diligent visionary,

beautiful confidant and on some nights

a good friend.

Our problem was

we accidentally fell in love with our good

sex.

The intimate touch of one another-

and before we knew it our relaxing

turned into kissing and our kissing

turned into cuddling and our cuddling

turned into sex… on the couch

with the blinds and windows open,

and on the stairwell

or in the front seat of the car

before and after church service.

And the attraction grew so strong

that for years we decided to grow our separate ways

branch out like moon lit rays, we tried our very best to stay away

and pretend we don’t love each other

in such a way-

But anyway, we could not

and our dysfunctional relationship of love making

and never love giving

turned some part of his heart cold,

burned some hollow places whole,

shot some things we believed bold.

and then one night

I was lying under his arm thinking

When did he grow this bitter black callus over his soul?

This worn, cynical scale over his love,

this I don’t care what I break

but I need to take, take, take- attitude.

So mean that he could dine on rattlesnakes for super

copperheads for a snack, I take that back

vipers for his brunch and eels, cobras and water moccasins for lunch.

how originally I thought we would eventually

find our way to be together.

I pit optimism against experience... as if his love was a game.

But I lost- I know I could not take his last name.

No sense in it, no need- it wouldn't be the same.

Cause everyone would know me best as the woman,

beautiful or smart- that married the man

(who couldn't decide whether he could love her)

that eats snakes... for dinner.

Centripetal force

Am I over him? I suppose I am since…

I analyze centripetal force more than

I believe we could work it out.

Am I over him? I think…

I also count the seconds between cars with about the same frequency that we would probably have happy moments.

Am I over him? Umm... I’m pretty sure that…

I nearly lose my lunch each time I think of women loving a man that refuses to love them with the same intensity.

Am I over him? So I guess…

Even if the world stopped turning

And all the water slid off its part onto the dry part

And a whole bunch of people got drowned; I still couldn’t see us together.

Am I over him? I imagine you would say…

I’m not. Because loving someone requires you to know that person,

And knowing some people can compel you to never stop loving them.

Once

Once

I gathered up all my trust and slid it across the

east coast just so I could

love someone real hard

And another time

I busted open the piggy bank of my soul

and opened myself like an apple

for someone to know I cared enough to be that vulnerable

And there was this one time

that I decided that

the depth and density of my heart was just so big

that I could withstand loving someone without them even loving me back

And the last time

I tried to love someone

I built stone dreams on sand castle blueprints

and in return they loved me like a jack lantern loves pumpkin seeds

and I and we and they were empty

So now I decided that heart is a big balloon

and it really will pop

And heck, if I was meant to love without reciprocity

Birds were meant to exist without song

or sun without shine

And hell, smoke was meant to exist even without fire.