You dominate my thoughts

somehow we let Milan Kundera’s
lightness of being float off
as heaviness of reality
pulled lip corners low
we catch stars
only on the way down
down
down burned
into dust in the sky
can we believe his words

once

is

nonce

and pretend this never happened?
you have Ayn Rand on your side
I have Anais Nin on mine
did she give you permission
some kind of intellectualized reason
to snap me into non-existence
erase me, the one who no longer followed suit
in your pursuit of happiness

last I heard you were in an accident
and I wonder if your life tripped
through an accelerated slideshow
and could you reduce me into a
a single screen capture?

you answered with silence

and then more silence

leaving me to invent myself as in your dream
and wakeful memory until all goes black
except me and Anais and our colored notebooks
reporting and revising your fingertips
that strung down my ribs as you asked
“Fernie, when when are you going to open up to me?”
trying with half a heart to untie corset laces pulled tight
tight into forced breath

my scene: you in the white towel
our scents fresh erased
I watch from the bedroom
you forget to put on that famous smile
your face, fallen, sullen, shows your age
as you tuck in the remnants of the evening
and wonder how it moved so fast
you, already in tomorrow without me

and Anais tells me
no! don’t fret so! this is not our Henry
we were ready to let him go
don’t you remember?

we cannot fold back into days of dominated thoughts
gobbling down each other’s words and fingers for breakfast
I didn’t think you would figure us out so quickly
and I do not suppose
it would be within your philosophy
to call goodbye
down from that straight and narrow path you walk
as you train for perfection
without a moment free to
kick down a sharp rock
break my circle
give me my laces back