Spring texted me. It said, "A/S/L?"

hours-old rain speckles the outside of the window

droplets glisten like self-contained secrets but are

stale with the scent of a spring who wont

let us fondle her supple branches

and her superior outline becomes a mirage in the city streets

found in lamp posts, soggy boulevards and empty porches.

she operates with a certain callous protocol

disingenuously convincing her admirers while they turn victim.

and she succeeds, with an amount of effort it takes to pull back a mouse trap

set it on the kitchen floor

and wait

we leap for the cheese

i mean, we are from wisconsin

and suddenly, there's hope in the destination

moments made with broken bones usually get a bad wrap but...

with april showers come may…

come what?

the promise of something else.

and

our bones turn brittle with the realization that we can't let her go,

or drift away like 

winter and summer somehow stuck a deal

when a blizzard pushed its way right into

a humidly hellish day in July

and did away with this anxiety-inducing bitch

who couldn't pick her poison 

or set a date

or send a save the date 

or be on time or even late

she doesn't take her time, she makes her own.

so

we cant take her seriously 

but still watch for a chance to

approach her at a bar

petrified

of her windsplitting curves like

she moves with the fluidity of

white, whipping sails across bows of

ships we'd never set sail with

she wraps her best up with her worst 

and that's what's so addictively angering about this sexy season

the worst dangerously transitions into her best

splattering her pleasures across the earth in such a fashion even jackson pollock 

would wonder if he stole her style, cock his head and…

well he couldn't say much really

except do his best not to fuck up a befitting bukowski quote,

revealing

 "i hated you when it would have taken less courage to love."

cuz when we're

waiting this long

for her 

loveless caresses drenching the surface, porous and willing,

her ill effects pooling up, still swirling with intentions of growth, warmth, renewal.

pursing her lips, she lays in bed, with her legs spread and

lets us love her

because she knows, she knows she'll never have to stay.

but today, there was Jesus.

Her photo reminds me what it was like to be reserved, sacred, untouched.

And I haven’t talked to her in three years but

I can’t think of one thing that’s taken me to that place in

Days

The whiskey took care of that, lining up shot glasses. delights to tilt down my throat into this working machine. Causing catastrophe to rip between blackouts and brash backlash brain bangings, disconnectors, sparks of temporary, intoxicated malfunction. I awake with this interjected survival in the corners of my eyes and dribbling from my lips because actual survival has become laughably, sustainably dull.

Her photo reminds me what it was like to wonder

And I can’t think of one thing that’s taken me to that place in

Months

We convert to business attire and revert on weekends like running backwards into adolescence keeps our minds spry while our hearts run dry. I drink down the motor oil that comes through in my brown eyes, dark elixirs keep ‘em shining

Her photo reminds me what it was like to have a plan,

One I haven’t executed in

Years

Not since I was acquainted with the heaviness that sticks to our main vein in adulthood. The compulsory imaginary weights as the clock tick tocks our chests caving in with the thoughts of when, where, what, why, who; on repeat.

But her image, light skin accented by features I both revered and despised because there was something exciting about how boring she seemed, like a story stunted – and jolted back by what I’d vigorously fill in each blank. And we’re back in class juxtaposed – she with her soft-spoken mannerisms and me a sailor-mouthed convention killer. Back to a place where hope bloomed like the wild flowers they planted to beautify campus corners. Back to a time where the future was something to be touched, melded, made, instead of something to find in the closet, dust off, and then place back to gaze upon another day.

When there was “time.”

Cuz aint nooooo body got timmmmme for that? Now do they?

And ain nobody often get a reminder of that, now do they?

But today, I had the time for her reflection and it’s a reminder that

What I am and what I’ve become

Is not the only way

and what makes my beauty is the fluidity to change

Because

people mock religion like they don’t subscribe to their own bastard beliefs they’ve made up just the same. Just because you don’t take a man and call him savior doesn’t mean you aren’t baking your own crowbar cake and trying to escape.

You worship the bottle

Or a job

or a cash flow

or another human

or love

as you would a savior

but today, there was Jesus, 

and there was whiskey,

and there was her face staring back at mine like she held the eternity of space and I was a speck in it or even out of it, I didn’t care, just to know she still exists as she was back then, was enough

these three become the same ingredient: savior.

so I take exactly what today’s recipe calls for

and leave the rest for someone else who needs it more.