After Cyndi Lauper
I’ m in the barricade hearing the clock thickening you.
Autumn encircles a confusion that’ s nothing new.
Flash back to warring eyes almost letting me drown.
Out of which, a picture of me walking in a foreign head.
I can’ t hear what you said. Then you say: Cold room,
the second that life unwinds. A tinctured vase returns
to grass. Secrets doled out deep inside a drum beat out
of time. Whatever you said was ghostly slow like
a second hand unwinding by match light. Lying back
to the wheel, I shirked confusion. You already knew.
Suitcases surround me. You picture me too far ahead.
Yet I can’ t hear what you’ ve said. You say: Doldrums,
some secondhand wine. Love, you knew my precincts.
The stone house turned out black, the scenic tunics
were deep inside. Who said home? Oh, I fall behind.
That very secret height blinds. Lying like a diamond,
the cock-thickening of you: hunchbacked arms, eyes
left behind. You’ ll picture me walking far, far ahead.
I hear what you’ ve done. You said: Go slow. I feebly
bleed out. Matthew’ s sermon turned out to be glass.
I wander in windows soft as Sour Patch. No rewind.
But something is out of touch and you, you’ re Sinbad.
That second date totally mine. Lying in a vacuum,
the thickening plot thinks of you. The future’ s not new.
touchdown. Lights. All those celebrity behinds.
A suitcase full of weeds. You picture me coming to.
You: too close to me to hear what you’ ve already said.
Then you say: The second wind unwinds. Doves whistle,
halving their dovely backs, watching out windows to see
if I’ m okay. See it, the dulcet moment? I’ m like thicket
tinkering for you. Fusion nothing you knew. Flash back
to seagull-beguiled eyes. Sometimes talking to a barren
lad. Such music so unbearably droll. The hand is mine.
Random picture frames off the darkness. A Turing machine?
Scotch-taping through windows, stolen from deep inside
rum-beaded thyme. You say also: Behind sequins & hinds...
And I’ m in the barricade hearing the clock thickening you.
Clematis enclosures, walking with news, pollinated by a
secondary grief, while something reminds you of our love.