portrait

i have a damage of my own i need to fix in you
done in part by rule and the other of my thumb
a gift you wore like the painted still life canvas
i drew out on you in blue and then in blood

the scar i left is healing the burning oil
it festers cool in places kissed the most
no reasoning for loving is an open knife
given daily by
to wake some holy ghost

no time to sit and forage thru the embers
the faggots burn red-blue like smoldering ore
sing justice on the breaking downs of timber
ringing hot like vintage girls with no remorse

the blowing leaves outside your window clutter
near the ashes of a fathers paramour
they haunt with you the spirit of that wind
and you push and shudder and gently close the door

when rapture meets the cold upon your bed
is my hand alone enough to rue the knot
to warm the substance of some inmost fire
and untie the nuisance hanging in your thoughts?

is it not breath that comes to you in silence rendering
not breath that feels beneath you to your room?
the breath that wakes you softer than the morning hours do
breath that cuts much deeper than the wound?
renewed this breath of absence bleeds removed


jPayne 3.31.10
photo jP summer 09