Steph Bruzon

by S. Bruzon

You have found me at an unfortunate time.

I hum shaman confessions, hum a wounded night.

But when my plea for less
has proven incorrect
and I bloat with light,

don’t you think that we could live together?

When the firmament has cracked in two
and the yolk sun seeps through,

we could take a sabbatical.

Picture fervor at the dinner table,
no murmurs–high voices–
slices of good fortune.

You’d lick the lot and say,
It is not golden–can I hold it
(and forget to give it back) to
stand there, wanting–for once–
the things that stay.

When you look at me,
my world breaks in the familiar way.

And oh, to reach out and–
never
  never
    never–
I dream
lands that we might inhabit together
  followed by a jaded waking
      to
    giving/
    taking
    hands,
the thing that you could say to make it better
    plans to be
silent silent
silence
THE END.

It’s too bad.
I like the noise
you make

when you
take place for me

our cotton ceiling
caves in
and I
can
see
plasma,

though the clouds are clad
in silken fire,
silver-cuff shackled
through
and I can’t reach
all there is to say—
so I hum a witty phrase
and ask that
you

listen past it.

My veil is made of chiffon
and cowardice,
enough to live with,
enough to know that

illusions are a fraction of the truth.

And you feel real
(which is to say)
you are the illusion that
has offered me the most–

the soil that plugs my ears,
the noise that I am in debt
to
LAUGHTER TO SWEAT
from sleep to wake
TO NOT FORGET
you–

when
all
day
dreams
drown.