Before the Weekend

Foto: Angela Stephenson


It was going to be your birthday the Saturday.
The Friday morning, i was by the window with a cigarette
Looking out at the low roofs under the gentle lace of the 8am sunlight,
Perched over the city, or our portion of the city.

A seagull floated by close to the ledge.
It had a large wingspan, and was going no place in particular,
Just soaring.
Then another, bigger or closer i couldn't tell. It all happened so fast

I thought of catching them somehow
And tying a banner between them
"Ainhoa I Love You" and setting them free again

It was going to be your birthday the Saturday
And the Friday morning, i wanted our love
to unfurl over the city, over our portion of the city
over the shoppers in El Gotico
Over the faithful in La Sagrada Familia,
Over the mopeds and commuters on Diagonal
And then out to sea
Under the gentle lace of the morning sun.

This is Just to say.

Our bodies sleeping
make the shape of a cartoon heart.
Knees touching, backs arched away
Noses touching.

Faces so close the focus fades
and flickers. Camera angles all wrong for porn
but for an indie film
A mumblecore magnus

it'll do.

"You made me think it didn't matter
until it mattered"

I wrote on hotel note paper.
And: "The other night,
When we were asleep in some Hotel bed, your breath
Moving through your voicebox
Made perfect harmonics."
I wrote a verse about "Your timpani breasts
and violin bow legs"

It is in the moments close to sleep
Where my chest swells. In the static of closed curtain night vision,
too dark for any camera
The touch of hotel sheets
and your body underneath
?

Moon Pix

Photo by Ray Potes

"Have you ever seen a Cheshire Cat Moon?"
We're nowhere romantic. Leaning out of the window of her apartment block and smoking. It's not cold enough for our breath to condense yet. It's early in the death of the year.

"Isn't it like that tonight?"
"Not really. It's too yellow. I saw one once from the backseat of my parents car. We were driving through Florida, one of those 30 hour drives we would make in the summer."
"What did you think about on those drives?"
"Late at night when there was nothing to see but i wasn't tired enough to sleep i would sing to myself."
"Along with the radio?"
"No, just the songs i knew by heart. I was 10 or 11, and it was mostly Bon Jovi and Belinda Carlisle"
"I once got shouted at by a friend of my older brothers for getting the words to Heaven is a Place on Earth wrong."
"What are the lyrics to that? Do they even make sense? 'Baby do you know what's worth'"
"Baby, do i know what what's worth?"
"Do you know what's worse?"
"What's worse?"

She doesn't answer. We're both staring up into the too yellow moon, lost in our imperfect thoughts.