JuniperusVox

Re-Awakening

Faces fly in and out of the door, and my jaw aches from warm, welcoming smiles. The map crinkles on the desk, the same places marked in ink again and again. Chalk dust coats my fingers while names are written and erased, written and erased, written and erased. Voices meld into amalgamous cacophony, save one.

A sound of low honey-wine, soothing and warm. Soft, caressing whispers to make me shiver. Supple, sliding fingers to make my breath escape. Warm, beating hearts to make my blood quicken. A glowing, vibrant soul that puts my pen to paper.

The click of a handle, a door swings open, and a face steps out. A beautiful, smiling face that compels me across the threshold. Lips that needed to be felt against my own, to weave a cord around my heart to yours.

This is from when I was working at a hostel and my now-wife was a guest staying for a few days. We spent some fun nights together. When they checked out, I followed them out to say goodbye and asked if I may kiss them (worked out, luckily!). Afterwards I wrote them this poem because I am nothing if not extra.

Funny fact: I was also living at that hostel, which was a converted single family home, doing a work trade. Which meant I lived the lesbian dream of "the one" simply walking into my living room.

Inspiration

The screen lit on my face like some half assed light at the end of the tunnel.
I wondered when it would tell me all the words to write down,
what great epiphanies it would reveal to me.
I found out that the glare stings after a while,
and that the words will only come with a sacrifice of
blood and tears
onto my 101-keyed altar.
I never did get any beautiful, flowing words or heartfelt confessions though.

All I got were these.

Ink bled from the stones on the path, scarring the earth. It was the blood of all that walked through your heart. Who walked, and ran, and stomped, and stumbled, and crawled. They carved furrows, and they dug trenches, and they planted flags long since bleached to white and forgotten in the winds.

The skies churned and glittered. The purples, and yellows, and greens kaleidoscoping together in a gentle whorl. When they shifted, words rained down from the sky.

The words that forever float in the crevasses of your thoughts, told to you before you packed up your things, before you turned your face to the wind, who tried so hard to keep you moving, and saw the great gulf between you and they. All the stories and songs gently misting around you that you never really understood until then.

Vents opened in the earth around your feet, belching out the smell of cooking onions, of incense and candles, the smoke stinging your eyes. As your tears struck the earth, they shattered into laughter and sighs. Into the sound of zippers, the muted crunch of snow under your boots, and car doors just almost closing in sync.

On the breeze you inhaled the musty attics, of memories locked in cardboard boxes and shrouded in dust, the leather of books and paper, thoughts made solid from your hands. On the end of your breath, the echo of how your pillow tried to hold on to their essence for a little while longer, to give you a gift wrapped in cloth and hair when you laid your head down.

And you stood in the middle of your mind and looked out at the paths and trails of your soul. Some of them long since overgrown with brambles and thorns, where beyond lay naptimes and lincoln logs with those little dents when they fell down the stairs. The wind, your old friend, gently turned your face back to the west, where there be dragons and mountains. And you walked into the setting sun.

In case anyone is interested, I wanted to write a poem about the feeling of looking through one's memories before leaving a place you grew up with no intention of returning. In my case, when I left the east coast to move out west on a whim almost a decade ago. Writing in 2nd person felt fitting for this.