the bruises on back
are your slippery knuckles
kneading skin
and knotted laces
into submission
i’m too tender
like the trees
so far down below
spouting their first
white budded flowers
it hurts to move
to feel the wind push
too far in one direction
the blossoms loose
on their leaves, i faint
you don’t speak
you leave fingerprints
unseen on girls’ skin
like morning dew
gone by the afternoon
the neck lolls at night
a dying dandelion
drooping with moonrise
it’s so dark outside
and sleep seems more like
a question than an answer
INSIDE OUT
tires on the avenues are collecting rainwater
spraying the sound of what is already wet
with the flooded knowledge of misery
looming above is the dripping gray of charcoal
bloated into a wishy-washy cloud of spoilt milk
refracting against a muddied window
outside of it leafy trees sway with the rhythm of wind
inside the water lilies bloomed in the living room
lovely-long white petals spreading to an orange core
honeyed pollen falls one by one to the stained carpet
so similar to the wavering leaves in the autumn
you feel like the ground; uneven and misshapen
if I crawled up your body like I brush against the street
kissed your earlobe in the circumvention of arm’s heat
still the confusion blinking with doubt would not subside
even when walking outside at 4 a.m., a washed away world
maybe it’s the rain that distorts or prevents love
the phone cord twirled in my fingers remains unheard
CYNTHIA BLANK attends New York University where she is a Creative Writing Minor. She has been writing poetry, short fiction, and plays for a little over four years, and is excited to share these poems with readers.
(Artwork by Christopher Woods) CHRISTOPHER WOODS is a writer, teacher and photographer. He lives in Houston and in Chappell Hill, Texas. He shares a gallery with his wife Linda at MOONBIRD HILL ARTS-www.moonbirdhill.exposuremanager.com/
