Used To Know ★★★

I say I knew him well
as if this is a thing I stopped doing.
Knowing him I mean.
Instead I seem unable to displace
that ocean of unneeded trivial details
that comprise his uneasy memory.
The way his hands moved during his mounting anxiety.
The soft scent of him,
always bringing to mind the color green.
I can uselessly recall the way he takes his coffee -
with milk, two spoons sugar -
or the bend of his body in sleep,
the rise and fall of his chest
while I lay melancholic beside him,
afraid to make a noise.
Burned into my eyes
is the brand of that coiled form
How could there be such peace and burden?
Yes, I know him.
Or I know who he was,
the immortal frozen titan in sleep
so large and monolithic
in each small breath.
A body now more mine than his
in the recollection of his whispered presence,
caught in me and lost to him.
Just as I am stuck in other chambers still.
But if you saw us in a photo,
if any still exist,
and asked,
I would hear myself say,
in what must be my voice,
He’s just someone I used to know.

Grey ★★★

It’s the middle of the night
and the world consists
of brilliant flashes of color and gradients of black.
You sit beside me in the car
singing along to the stereo,
a forgotten album
from some one hit wonder from the nineties.
Instead of stars we get a charcoal grey
and the air is hot and sticks to the skin
filling our breath with thickness like oil,
but things are just fine
here with you.
My windshield blurs the lights of the cities we pass through
lens flares and psychic auras and ghosts
that we leave behind us each in turn
until we are left alone in grey,
but such a splendid shade it is for once
though I couldn't tell you why.