Love, you are not (2010)

Love, you are not -
as I have learned,
your affectations of affection
are mirror light from a dead star
the illusion of that which,
mistakes reversible,
might have lived.

It is no secret I have
kept you secret
for it seems daily my heart soars
into the tightening passage of my throat and my head nods
a passing hello
for years it has been thus – decades, eternities
a hundred times for everyone I pass we do this dance
a hundred times we pass
without incident

if you wonder if I would fall for you
then the answer is yes, if your voice fails you too
and yet if we are kindred, we cannot move
but to move away.

Love, you are not,
for a secret held is not a truth
my mind is meaningless, as are my lips
fingers
skin
breath

I have starved them from your company
murdered all that's left

but I know this to be so:
Such things live on in death.