The Sun Whispered a Secret

I went searching for sincerity 

and I started in the stars.

Up here, the words came clear to me.

I heard the song was ours.

The sun whispered a secret,

made me promise not to tell.

I told him I would keep it

safe and sound and well.

A wonder I could not have known,

but for the heat of his breath

that proved to me I'm not alone:

not in life, nor in death.

So, now I have my answer

and now I know my part

and when my eyes begin to blur,

I'll call it heaven's art.

*****************************************

"If I look up and the sky's not there, is there any reason that I should be scared? When a promise is a promise, I know." Pedro the Lion Promise

"They took your life apart and called you failure's art." Elliott Smith Tomorrow, Tomorrow

And Sleep Came Easily

It had been a long flight and, though his excitement filled him to his brim, he just could not express it either in words or expressions or gestures. She was just as he'd remembered, but he could not wrap his mouth and tongue into "beautiful."  She didn't say a single word, only smiled and placed a tall glass of ice water on the table. He leaned for the glass and lifted it to his lips. She watched his body maneuver slowly forward, watching his muscles stretch underneath his shirt, remembering how the small of his back felt with her palms pressed hard against it. She couldn't help herself, so she sat beside him and gently rubbed his back until the water disappeared from the glass.

By now, it was far too late to talk about it anyway. For him, it was too late even to lift his body to bed. His rough, tired eyes met hers and with his last spurt of energy, he leaned toward her and kissed her softly on her lips. His hands tangled in her hair and, when he opened his eyes again, there were tears down her cheeks and her smile stretched the entire Atlantic coastline.

He slouched back against the couch, his bed for this night. Hers too. With his arm securely wrapped around her shoulders, she lifted her legs off the ground and rested them over his, grabbing the throw blanket and tossing it over their already-warmed bodies. And sleep came easily. 

************************************

^ This is just a little vignette to remind myself how to write prose.

"So kiss me, darling. It's been a long time." Twin Forks Kiss Me, Darling

Closer

Sometimes my lungs don't work
so I choke on my own voice.
The rattling in my brain
is so loud
it could shake the earth
to sand.
I can't keep tabs
on time anymore.
It floats away from me
and up to the stars;
no watch on my wrist
can keep it.
I just need the ground
not to quake underneath
and the sky
not to glow red.
I need your fingers through my hair.
I need you so much closer.

*************************************************

"I'm calling from your house, in your room, in your name, lying in your bed, following your dreams. I listen to your voice get caught in my throat as I sing, 'This Is Just A Dream.'" Thursday Tomorrow, I'll Be You

"A question of space, a matter of time: I follow the stars until the first light." City and Colour Of Space and Time

"You can quake at the thought of it, shakes you up quite a bit. And all you do is think and thinking gets you nowhere." Balance and Composure Quake

"The sky is bleeding; the fog is thicker than walls. She's wrapped up in it like cloth on a wrecking ball." Radical Face Winter is Coming

"The distance is quite simply much too far for me to row. It seems farther than ever before - oh no - I need you so much closer." Death Cab for Cutie Transatlanticism

Your Lungs, My Dear

I was waiting there for Quiet,
but she stood me up.
So, the wind cried through my windows
and the snow stomped on the ground
and, even with the lights turned off,
I could hear the taunting bulbs.

I looked around for Quiet.
Maybe she just got lost.
My carpet roared;
my pillows snored;
my drawers yelled
at my socks.

Quiet wasn't in my notebook
or folded in my sheets.
She wasn't hiding in my closet.
She wasn't swimming in my pen.
She might be in your smile, though.
I sorta see her there.

I think she's in your lungs, my dear.
I think she's in our air.

********************************************************

"The quiet can scrape all the calm from your bones, but maybe it should, maybe we need to be hollowed to get up and grow and stop fucking around, to kick off our braces and start straightening out. Let's sift through the static to find a simpler sound Let's sift through the static to find a simpler sound..." Kevin Devine Cotton Crush

"The morning's hot and harsh. My notebook fills itself. The words come thick with sweat, but it feels like someone else is writing all of this: someone I just can't believe. So, I mop my brow, set my pen back down. I'm still me, still me." Kevin Devine Just Stay

"Black lungs, took you in when you were young,  and everyone around you, saw their sins so you measured up, and you wanted to find out, just how far you could go, all i wanted was a real you, am I getting through?" The New Frontiers Black Lung

A Solemn Sort of Heaven

The stars are afraid of the dark
so they shiver and shake.
Through the vacuum, they embark.
All their wanderers, they take.
They do not want to be alone
or lost in the expanse.
Emptiness is all they've known;
they're longing for romance.
They waltz among the nebulae
to find their brethren.
Light years it is from sky to sky:
a solemn sort of heaven.

The stars would revel in delight
if only they could know
that tiny beings see their light
and bathe within their glow.

************************************************

I feel a great need to make some minor comments on this one, though I've been trying not to comment if at all possible.

First, stars don't actually twinkle (or "shiver and shake"). Our perceived twinkle is a result of the light passing through / being bent by the Earth's atmosphere.

Second, "wanderers" refers to planets. Our word for "planet" comes from the Greek word for "wandering star."

Last, the stars aren't moving closer to each other in the cosmos. The universe is expanding, so the stars and everything else are moving farther away from each other.

The wanna-be science nerd in me just needed it known that I know these things. If none of this matters to you, I hope you can just enjoy a little ditty about the stars for what it is...never-minding that is in no way even remotely scientifically accurate!

"When the sun fell down and fell asleep, drunk from drinking all the heat, it made a splash onto the sky. The stars stayed up 'til morning." Great Lake Swimmers Imaginary Bars

"You're everybody's satellite; I wish that you were mine." Counting Crows Recovering the Satellites

The Bird's Song

I walked through my days

as if the hours were liars
and I stuck to my path

without a purpose.

I thought I knew your name,

Love.

I thought I knew your face.

I thought I knew the bird's song.

With rough hands

and soft eyes,

I was pulled from behind

the shadows.

Darkness is light

and time is poetry
and I didn't know I was lost at all
until you came and found me.

*******************************





"Throw it all away, in the course of one day. Why can't you just go outside?" Hot Rod Circuit Irish Car Bomb

"In the shadows, the name is unknown to me." Sunny Day Real Estate Shadows

"Sew it on. Face the fool. December's tragic drive when time is poetry and, stolen, the world outside, the waiting could crush my heart." Sunny Day Real Estate Seven

Heart's Enough

Your kiss, I couldn't feel it

'cause my flesh is rough.

Your voice, I couldn't find it,

but your heart's enough.

Leave a trail of crumbs
and I'll follow

to see what comes,

to wallow.

My north star
calls
from afar,
falls,

but I'll find him here
tomorrow.

************************************






"Late at night, sync your heartbeat to mine. I will never try to forget your northern lights." The Rural Alberta Advantage Edmonton

Spectrum

We all travel on a spectrum

from dark to light to dark.

We're all searching for affection.

We're all looking for our mark.

But there is dusk and there is dawn

and there are rainy days and dew

and, in my head, there is a song

implanted there by you.

The sun can see us too

even when we're in our caverns:

a love, anew,

our phases and our patterns.

When the warm rays brush my cheek

like the fingers on your hand,

I can't find the words to speak;

yet I know you understand.

************************************************

"Then there was music and wonderful roses, they tell me, in sweet fragrant meadows of dawn and dew." The Beatles Till There was You

"So will you come back to my corner? Spent too long alone tonight. Would you come brighten my corner? A lit torch to the woodpile - aye. Come find me now where I hide and we'll speak in our secret tongues." Frightened Rabbit Woodpile

"And when you realize it's a pattern and not a phase, it's what you've become and it's what you will stay, that's ballgame." Kevin Devine Ballgame

"So what if it's freezing, I'm awake and I'm happy. The sun's steepling its shards on my floor." Kevin Devine Splitting Up Christmas

Clean Escape

I can't hear a thing,
through this fuzzy sound.
My ears, they still ring
and I can't find the ground.
Swirling and shaking
with my head in my hands,
the mess that I'm making,
no one else understands.
High above the cityscape
and miles from my pen,
"Perhaps I've made a clean escape,"
I wonder now and then.
But strangled is my honesty
and staggered are my thoughts.
Nothing makes much sense to me
and now I know I'm caught.
I'm trapped between your letters
and I'm lost within your lines,
but I think I think much better
when I have you on my mind.

*************************************








"You point to wisdom in a snow storm and all the drawbacks of the reborn, but then you talk of new experience and all the benefits of staying warm. You say there's poems on the front line. I guess I lost you on the back nine. I'm mixing metaphors with overtures and drowning out your memory in moonshine. But I'll decide when it's on my mind, when it's on my mind. I'll decide when it's on my mind, when it's on my mind." The Miracle of '86 When it's on My Mind


"From time to time, you cross my mind. Good company Is hard to find. From time to time, you cross my mind. So stay with me just for a night." Twin Forks Cross My Mind

Couplets and Limericks

She's scared for you to know

and scared for you to see

who she was long ago,

from whom she tried to flee.

Please do not lift the veil

or make a move too fast.

She'll shake from head to tail.

She'll never let it last.

Couplets and limericks,

she hides behind so well.

Unhinging rhetoric,

a story she could sell.

Her scars still sing her song

more than you'll ever hear

and though she knows it's wrong,

they'll never disappear.

Keep holding to her hand.

Don't let her run away.

You're more than she had planned;

she's better off this way.

**********************************************

"I tried to catch you in a couplet on my 4-track today, but my tongue tied, my tongue tied. I couldn't figure how to fit you on the spin and the tape. See, my tongue tied, my tongue tied." Kevin Devine Like Cursing Kids

"It's not even love any more. It's just a claim upon my soul." - Frank Turner Tell Tale Signs