Like your hand on the hot stove,
It's hard to avoid some moments.
They steam up the windows,
They shake the stage,
They kiss you so deeply
That you roil and churn
And nothing else matters.

There's the world that never was,
With all of its replays
And replays and replays.
Such a distant echo
Of what really happened,
Even roses aren't
Roses anymore.

Then there's the world that never will be
Where we happily aspire.
Painting things
In dreamy hues
That no brush can stroke,
No eye ever see.

The world that is is scary,
Too to-be-or-not-to-be.
We're drawn to the
Abstraction of a
Some-other flame that
Calls us and
By name.

The intimacy with worlds
That don't exist,
Never could exist,
Draws us like moths
To a vacuum.

I look up, and you're
Asleep on the couch.

01/31/2006

Posted on 01/31/2006
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