For Diana (in sections)

[i]

What lies between us is
sometimes nothing but a puddle, a
mess of digital codes and
frames of mind.
Hello, we could
meet under the simmering hush of stellar light and
starlings in the garden-
to lie along some fading beach
to speak of men and stars and
words that serpents slide along the
nape of a heated neck and nestle in the folds of a
gypsy-skirt.
And yes, maybe this is jazz,
to
move
to
feel that there is solid force of magic-

Yeah, one great, pretentious puddle.

[ii]
Maybe if I saw her,
she would be sudden
like
a primal strike of electric guitars

[iii]
What she speaks is flower-pressed,
images that paper lungs will make of paper words.
Yes, she holds them in the light
Tastes them for the flavor and they are
crystalline like new-formed ice.

Fresh in the ears and
laughing out the mouth.

[iv]

I am occasioned on some nights

To open my window

And play in your direction (the sound of each

Key is imperfect and I'd like to

Apologize for being out of practice)

Feel the air at sunset (Desire is the shape and

Shade of

Sun-dying-into-night-like-gypsy

red)

[v]

Ah, yes, there is still the hip-swing of being older (you could tell me how you first

Discovered boys and I will tell you of

Slick-skinned summers—John: his name), and we will

Slide-on-back through backstreets and

Throw our kisses for a stranger (Incubus: the bible on which

All love is made through golden milk of slow jazz and

Sculpted candles)

So that when we wake, we can wipe the

Residual lipstick on the mirror (yes, that was

Him and

This one too)

And laugh as if it will always be

The verge of spring.

[vi]

Alrededor de la falda de su sonrisa

Te empapas con la luz del sol

Y incluso la noche no podría tomar la prisa de sangre de tus mejillas.

Around the skirt of your smile

You are drenched in sunlight

And even the night could not take the rush of blood from your cheeks.

[vii]

Sometimes, for you, love is single-handedly a hard heart

(you'll never know what these small things you

say-write-feel

could touch in me)

Please tell me that under these

Miles and miles of snow,

This heart is still warm.

[viii]

And then, at other times, there were sparks of electric rain—

While I was cold and aimless, I

Wandered in your room, where it wasn't raining

You were there to greet me (smooth and sleepy-eyed) until the room

was warm to the tips of my toes and red red red—the walls, you see, were made of poetry.

And it was Sunday morning.

(a little side note: [vii] written after one of your tear-jerkers. All you, m'dear, all you.)