Waking Ourselves from Death

The sky is torn from mountain tops
and we sit here and hold each other's eyes.
The lies we keep to keep ourselves
asleep and tempered with this tenderness.
"God bless. God bless." I've seen you
when at rest and I believe the knowledge
of your lips. Believe the multi-layered glimpse
we live. Believe this brutal brevity. Believe
the width of every dream,
and the doubt it textures. Conjecture. Conjecture.
I paint the city walls with all the whispered names
for no one, let the bluish-black acrylic
flash across the night, peel the screen of heaven down
to blanket all our beds, the quiet of the house of lead.
The dread. The dread. The river of what's said.
The storm clouds on the morning of the light
that bathed your head. The bird song in the warning
of the city where we met. I said you said it's said,
our hands are always open, open to what's left,
open to receiving every drop of word that's read.
Believing each deception, because we're fictional at best,
but leaning out to kiss you, kiss you on the head, kiss you
on the neck, kiss you in this moment
when we wake ourselves from death
as a way to not forget.



by jerry gordon