Poem – Page 53 – A (wise) man of two faces

Preceding precipitates

Tiny little drops,
the misting advance guard of
the impending storm.

I gave the stars a name,
to most they seem the same
but each has their grace
and their own unique face
with no trace of shame.

The storm is coming,
black clouds on the horizon
herald a false night.

The summer runs down
my face, chest, under my clothes;
I’m saturated.

In the dark of the night
when I’ve just had a fright
I grasp my palms
and reach for a calm.

I get down on my knees
and my lips spill with pleas.
I promise it all
just to survive the fall.

But when those prayers fail
when the gods are deaf to my wails
it’s then I begin
to confess all my sins.

In desperate hopes my penance
will prove enough for recompense.

I don’t get people;
they have so much promise but
they cannot see it.

Break my heart, will you?
I don’t care, it’s
Too late for another
Chance to make things right.
Honestly, you don’t deserve it.

The grief of my friends
opens the skies in my heart
for the rain to fall.

The slip of a nip –
it’s over in a second,
remembered for days.

Their bodies spun and intertwined
with promises of who’d be thine,
and tongue and teeth met with bared breast
and the rest, they say, is the rest.

A decade later only shows
two fires which have burned too low
and people who are fumbling
with what was once a second skin.

And in their dire desperation,
they seek solace in confrontation,
and all the pain helps them forget
their bitterness and their regret.

But waiting for them in the dark
is tinder desperate for a spark.