This is me trying.
Trying to understand the why,
When blood turns black and sends us awry.
Tears flow from what might have been,
Words spiral and begin to spin,
Round and down into the spaces,
Filling all the little places.
Piercing my heart through and through,
Like burning needles of an emblazoned tattoo.
 
This is me trying.
Trying to remember that familiar know,
When we huddled close in the shadow,
Underneath the flower’s petal,
Away from warmth of the whistling kettle.
But I always felt safe from the bitter cold,
And I long to be back in that hold.
Back to where no one else could see,
That part where you became a piece of me.
 
We’d cherish each other through the days,
You’d hold me with your loving gaze,
Your mechanical, machinery eyes
Pulled me into your celestial sky,
Full of butterflies.

You etched paintings in my mind’s trance,
Colors on your skin twirled and danced,
Then the ancient caves became mere decadence.
 
And I would play you a romantic song,
With a melody so sweet and long,
So our laughter frolicked on the breeze,
And sang its tune through the autumn trees.
From Mother’s lips a serenade of chance
With a chorus of shadows on every branch.
 
This is me trying.
To get my hapless heart to beat,
In a rhythm that is not pretty or neat.
But create a world where the moon,
Controls more than the tides. And soon,
The flower petal withers and you see
All the tiny fragments that amount to me,
Form together one dependent part,
Existing forever in the tattoo heart.