A Night You Needed Me

I lay with you last night
asking why I want I want I've wanted you, you, yes, you,
and yet my only comfort is to hold you though I'm roused;
just to breathe in sync for hours while you sleep,
to think, to reminisce, to try to find my secret key
to your heart, my heart that now I realize is brass.

Your fox-rimmed, hooded leather costume mystifies me
till I walk behind you, your naughty womanhood,
costumed in a youth you do not need for me, for anyone:
your boots, your jeans, your darkened eyes
alluring to me and you, and yet so wanting wasted in allure.

You ask me only to be your friend, a friend, and I see it now:
I have never understood what I've had to offer you, you've seldom asked,
the you who've given me so much, so selfless, timing perfect in its edgy way,
and now it turns to this sleepless night, parsing breath and silence
holding my beating heart to yours, your electric anahata,
breathing in, breathing out while you finally sleep and breathe and sleep
baring my regrets, my endless negligence exposed, not just in dreams,
my loss so obvious yet not to me till now.

Chimera

The twins, the other voices roaming free in my brain ...
My whole wholly personal family
telling me I'm perfect
telling me I'm an idiot
telling me to share
telling me I'm wrong
telling me I'm bad
telling me the way ...

so often telling.