PATMOS
Will Mountain Cox
Tonight sounds like a Kanye song,
the old ones, but the new Kanye.
Whatever, not important.
the Book of Revelation was written
just down the road, and I'm in the ocean
just down the road
letting the waves push me
and tug me, in and out of my plans
for the future. For the moment
everything is triangles
and insecurities
and major arcana cards.
The high priestess is you
the hanged man, me, but reversed
and we have cups full of sea water
with knights and pages to serve us
at our ocean table for eating
alone.
I try only drinking
two drinks a day
before dinner.
but the sun is hot as all its dangers,
making us drunker than two drinks
in the dark
ever could.
making us thirstier than two drinks
at a birthday
ever could.
I pull.
I really pull.
but I push myself to more healthy relations:
the high vegetal
and thick protein options
of sex
and love
and what we need but never order.
In want of health
I ordered myself another drink,
laid my guilts across your gummy eyes
and found myself
hanging on your words.
As high priestess you demanded me to whisper
saints before drinking.
I told and cried and begged for you
to cut me off. Instead
like the gods you plan to be, you asked me,
‘who will we eat for dinner?’
You ordered the salad
with cucumbers
and tomatoes
and feta
and olives
and the fish too,
and together it made me happy.
But I was already failing
to wait thirty minutes. The memories
waiting just 30 seconds before allowing themselves
some drowning.
If there was garlic in our dinner
then I’ll be fine, that's what the cards say,
that's what my mouth says,
reeking of care
and the salt that's in the water
washing it out.
I spit a fountain, smelling like care
toward you on the shore,
toward you on the hike
to get here,
towards you in the city we came from,
where we were different.
The ocean smells like a Greek salad now,
and like fish too,
from having my mouth in it.
I like the way you smell
when you tell me my future,
like garlic and care,
pulling me and tugging me
in and out,
up and down,
like a moon
who knows when it's wanted
and yet still comes back.
Again and again,
find me hanging
with my head in the water
and my feet in the air
for some kind of unnecessary trick
of looking good
while failing to listen.
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