Struggle in Bondage

February 3, 2004

The force of your hands
on my wrists, pushing up
towards the ceiling,
to let you see the me
as I am right now.

The force of your body
up against the mirror
where I used to see all
that I often believed real.

The force of your eyes
still trying to catch me
in moments of unwary
surprises between us.

The force of your voice
caught up in my throat.

I'll tell you again and again,
"I can hear you every night."
I'll keep telling you,
"...and I still want to."

The salty tears coming again
because I am clear about
how little you want this.
Those words filled my nights
with thoughts that I might
have some gifts left to come
from out of the sky.
But rain meets my face tonight
icy... a sleeting vision
where slush and icicles
have kept preserved inside me
all those desires to make
this dream into flesh.

I'll still tell you
"I'm in love with you."
I still know this too,
"I will never hold on to you."

Each word I write is filled
with every vile, tired night
I slept with your ghost.
I tried to make my life
filled with everything else
that could keep me distracted.

But I keep whispering
"My secret has come untangled."
I keep repeating,
"Do what you will with the past..."

My eyes close again
in despair of your denial
in words of explanation
that leave me a wreck
of emotions that I can't say
I didn't expect from you.

I'm still screaming
"My love is worthless and vague"
I'm still crying
"I have become the nothing you want me to be!"

I keep doing it, though:
I will keep coming here
into the fold of your arms.
I'll let you stretch me out,
raise my hands above my head,
kiss me until I believe in you.
I'll let you topple my resolve
and take inside me that object
from which I've been blinded.

I still hear you say
"I love you more than the lie of this life."
And Love whispers to me
"Every word you say is mine."

More and more, I'm coming
into my own life,
knowing that I've pushed hard
against all the times your cold
froze me in lonely nights.

And I sob again
"Why should it be you?"
And my eyes are red
"You love with reserve and hold me back."

I sink into wet soil.
I come up a mud mess.
I think I believe in you,
only to have you offer me
the shame you feel for me.
The two of you killing me again.
I only hope my three give you
that same sense of nothingness.

"As long as I live, I will not be free.
I am your slave today
just like every other year," I say.

The dispossessed, devoted, dimented, deviation
that keeps me tied up in your dreams
while I wish for it all to end,
to come with notes of finality.
I think of just one, small slide
of tongue over saliva lips
that promise me some salvation,
and again, I am owned.

"Whatever you dream is real,
is real only to you and me
and never for everyone else," you say.

Love is up in the air,
but tonight I don't look.
Trust has given me more debate.
I see the letters there today,
as I did at the start of the year.
I see the orange sunrise
that glows in your eyes
asking me, "Do you trust me?"

The part of me that is yours
is just about all of me.
I struggle with one part
that fights just to be me!
Because I'm not there with you,
and I've never had you here with me!
Every animal sound of misery
emanating from my voice is yours.

"There's a chair here
where you can sit
beside me, forever here," you said.

My eyes roam home
where I invited Love
into my heart, just to be
refuted.

"If you love me, you have to come to me."
"If you love me, you will find me."
"If you love me, come to me, find me."
"I'm here. I'm home."
"Everytime I breathe
it is your name I whisper."

The justice of my game is
never played out in song,
as I watch your back
see your eyes,
play this game,
get tied up,
get down into your pain.

My question repeats,
"Will I ever get a reward
for devotion that you can't
acknowledge because of fear?"

Time, beauty, hardened clay,
and all of my nothingness...
Do you even remember which was me,
which was him, and which was you?
I remember your fear.
I remember your regret of me.
I remember the words I heard
everytime my mind slipped away.

"I still hear the same words!"
I scream out to myself.

I tried to think that
the words could be forgotten.
I tried to believe that
I could be free from you.