Is your love HyperQBic?
Does it have colorpuntal pearls like a ghost poem?
Here we go again.
I’m not thirsty, you’re thirsty
AN IDEA OF IMPROVISATION
AS MUCH ADU ABOUT NOTHING
“Didn’t I tell you what I believe,
did somebody say that . . .”
Sade
Ifemi, wasn’t it
only this morning
that Helen’s whispers
filled my ears
like a bowl
of virgin olives
while her fingers—
half flame, half feather—
counted every curl
on the back of my neck?
But all moons wane
and who traces
her phases of the moon
tattoo now?
And perhaps not wane
as in failure
but something else
in the key of F
which I hum
under my breath
until her cabernet lipstick
sips me once more
like a sommelier
or her manicured nails
re-press their crescents
into the midnight sky
of my back?
Hummingbirds
hover over petals
for the beady paradise
of nectar—
is it a rhyme
in F Minor
if the even nutty aroma
of almond blossoms
can’t stop me
from being spotted
like a Luna moth
under the halo
of her porch light?
Oh, freckled cheeks of Jesus,
I now grasp
why Shakespeare claimed
Cupid kills
some with arrows,
some with traps,
because which angle
of light unveils
what might bloom
or burst in her irises?
If I dissolve
into the blue flame
of her breath,
do I subsist
as breath,
or simply burn?
Is it a ditty
in the key of F
—as a saxophone
curls into cursive—
that a fool for roses
must be
a fool for rain?
I don’t believe
she meant
“a love like hours won’t last”
even as the ache
braided into her ponytail
swung from that first flame
of dopamine
to our last adieu.
Should our eyes meet again,
I won’t underestimate
her wrist’s brassy passion
for prayer beads
& police bracelets.
Ifemi, how long
can I believe before the traces
of sandalwood & citrus
in her hair
try to settle
what every scent
tries to mean
about waning as a way
of staying?
