calm

outside - winter rain.
in the dark, bodies stretching
prepare to begin

Hunter

nights like this you can really feel it
how cold it is
how cold it all should be
how unnatural all this heat is

all these tiny pyres
little rhythms of fire and breath
leaking into the open sky

and fall away with them
if you wish
let yourself rise like clouds

there is nothing between you
and the stars

from up here you can see
all the thousand sputterings
and sparks you left behind

observe the arrangement of lights

the constellations we reside in

up here it is easy to see how they flicker
to remember the space between bodies
and the ways it is filled
how heat is created

how it pours out

with every breath and thought
every word and tear
in every second

how it rises and expands and grasps the night
how it spreads and turns
how it burns
how bright it is

Doppler

we've been through this so many times before
that I keep losing my place
and skipping to bits we haven't earned yet

shared jokes and days in bed
immunity to rain
no longer asking questions after dark

or failing to notice
that we're past those things entirely

and it's only in watching your hair turn red
that I can know you're shifting from me again.

night porter

I was walking by in the rain
when I saw you,
back from another night of
risks and failed intention.

You stood in that marbled cavern,
still uniformed
in the hours most refused to wear,

your attention full like the moon

for the footsteps
of a rare visitor to your hall.

I felt it with you,
that thrill of the expected arrival,
the practiced movements waiting beneath your skin

for the moment of their unveiling.

It is an energy more vivid
than the storm which soaked me
as I passed by
in a ragged uniform of my own.

pebbles

we spoke of risk
in our carefully dramatic voices
and we found it all through the evening

in cards stuck to tables
or ricocheted plastic

or the chance connection of knees

but with the rain
and the many steps home;
blind from the rivers on my face

I knew that taking one step
could not be so hard