Additional love poetry can be found on Substack

C-2
I remember
	   the precise color of your eyes
	   your gentile yet firm touch
	   the feeling as I ran my finger along your scars
	   learning about metamorphosis
	   accepting I would never truly understand
	   learning to be comfortable with my own ignorance
It was not
	   my life to live
	   my story to tell
I woke the next day with
	   your taste on my lips
	   the smell of your body on mine
	   your breath on my neck
	   a deep yearning for more
	   a better understanding of what it is to be a man



V-1
i think about the day we met
the hustle and bustle of a busy kitchen
smoke, fumes, loud voices
and mess, everywhere, smearing the floor
threatening to make any one of us fall
the clanging of dirty silverware and hastily stacked plates
the sweat: pumping hearts and constant rushing
one chance statement carried throughout the room
a smile and a laugh and a question
nervous muttering and blushing
cold panic mixed with longing
how did I get this lucky?



L-3: the bartender
i’ve seen those eyes before
smiling out a mirror back at me
twenty years back, maybe more
unsure of myself and who i’d be

your unsteady glances and hint of smile
remind me of days long gone by
a time when I was soft and smooth and bold
and traced the lines of my lover’s eye

there’s a craving there of which you’re well aware
it’s you after all who invited me here
to sit and to watch as you work, chat, and smile
your flashes and supple soft air do beguile

your hair is thick with an unruly wave 
your moving and bending yield flashes of skin
there are secrets in those dark coy eyes
though destined for nothing, i’d do this again

youth has the means to get what it wants
whether attention or something much more, i’d give
see, i too was once a young man with a smile
though agéd eyes are the proof that I lived

this will never be more
than an affair of the mind
of the hand
of eyes
of the dark