she wears scarves

alright, so i kinda failed at the poem a day thing. it was a little overambitious for someone who had never had a regular blog before, but i thought it might be cool. once i've got a little more experience i'd like to try it again. maybe over the summer, i'll have tons of time in south carolina. anyway, i'm still going to update semi-regularly. keep the comments coming? they help in ridiculous amounts.

I wrote this last night at the Where There's Smoke There's Fire show, which was awesome incidentally. Hope you like it.

She Wears Scarves

we are never home
because home is where you hang your hat
and you don't wear hats so much
you wear scarves, which we
wrap around your head like shawls
playing at disguises and
super-fly super-spy fantasies
you wear scarves
because i don't like jewelry
because silver and gold look
gaudy against your neck,
i prefer it naked
a stretch of almondine desert
extending, when you tilt your head
i kiss your collarbones like correspondence
there is a message i want to send you
but what i can't seem to do is fit
the address of your affections
on the front of a white envelope
the postal service has somehow failed me.

but you are never home anyway, though
sometimes you stay at my apartment
in brooklyn, pull back the blinds
to let the light in, you tell me
that you feel safe there
that i contain a temple in
the curve of my spine so you
crawl inside when you need to hide
and shout for sanctuary
but you've never bled for brooklyn
no D-train dreaming, when you
wake your eyes unfold like the roses
that refuse to bloom easily in new england
needing south carolina sunshine. you
are a grapevine in a tapestry of temperance
and you are ripe to be picked
i want to feel the juices drip down
my fingertips when i squeeze you
build us barrels out of old oak so
we can age together

you are never home because
physical distance divides us, so
you criss-cross county lines
constantly in your car, though
i think that we have come too far
to find out that are hearts
are not elastic enough, that
they cannot stretch over any
homemade mess, surround it
and get over it

you rotate slowly in your sleep
as if the world revolves around you
and maybe it does, I have felt
the pull of your gravity sufficient
to believe you are the axis of everything
and i orbit in your arms, so
in such a central location
it is beyond protestation that we
are always at home.