Nostalgia: Bird Covered Lungs

10/2/08

We count stars and identify speckled winged birds
While the vultures circle,
Inspecting our deaths with magnifying glass eyes.
You sing lies through your teeth,
Leaving him there with the headless girls,
Hearts covered in dirt and moss,
Hands filled with bones and hair.

You let him follow the maps beneath your skin,
The words exploding from your lips covered in his kisses.
We were never meant to die, he whispered,
Feathers covering his lungs.
You are like the vultures,
Like their loud screams for dying,
The sound from their wings.

You whisper to him through counted stars,
A caged mouth,
Please come back.
i know you can hear my voice when i sing,
And i know of your flickered dreaming,
Her body against yours,
Dancing to the missing beat,
Your eyes filled with nothing.
i felt it then, that nothing,
The sky at night when it rains.

You hear his sirens, but you never see his lights,
His breath against your neck,
Lips pressed to your ear with a mouthfull of sand,
It's okay, you can come too.
i'll take you with me across the ocean,
Up through the trees as they sing for you,
i'll hold you in the palm of my hand against a pulse.

And when you wake up in the morning,
His sunlight kissing your eyelids,
He will show you how you look inside.
You were everything, he says.
You were the dull metal saw blades covered in rust,
Sharp cornered plastic,
Broken glass mirrors,
Bones and red paint birds,
Sunset skies,
Wolves,
Smells of sounds,
Everything they say they see,
You never could.