Poem Pilled: poem for paris
poem for paris
pray for me. nothing is wrong i just want everything i want.
- @solarishilton on twitter
i love paris in the springtime, the way paris would love
to have a wife. the way a wife would love to have a wife.
once i went to paris for a tie-dye shirt. i’m in it now, great,
& i’m thinking of paris, which i love—
that the shirt reminds me of paris & also paris, who is a boy
& one of several cities full of history i.e. violence & liars,
butter & cigarettes, don’t forget churches i guess
& a woman who knows what she's doing. paris, like me
& life itself, is complicated, which makes us interesting,
doesn’t it? dangerous too. paris & me, we’re more same
than different. for instance, we’re both kind of improbable,
if you think about math, which we hate, so we don’t.
we have expectations for how the world ought to be.
we can—which is not to say that we should—suffer bullshit,
& in some ways we don’t. then again, in more & more
real ways, we do. just like a mother. mothers love paris
in theory. mothers love me— i am desperate to please.
it’s getting harder to care about being beautiful
but paris & me? cannot help what we are. we’ve inspired
a lot of bad poetry. paris, like me, is romantic, & filthy
& full of bones & fury and oh, get a load of our culture.
we do not want to work until we are dead, or unwilling
to stay alive. get a load of this light, & this rage & this rage
& all of these graveyards. tell the world paris is everything,
everything. tell the world paris is burning.
lemon (trying to take a picture of the moon)
cento from & for lemmy
running full speed into a field when the mornings arrive
from a distance of 3,000 miles, to this heart that loves
& breaks (another way to soften). to this house of 1,000 balloons.
i came as best i could. o runner, cleaner, keeper of memory—
o you, whoever is listening—lemon. did you not have everything
you needed? i yell your name & you’re here, asking for grace,
time, white spiders in moonshine. there was never a moment
i didn’t want you, pardoning yourself, picking locks,
wildflowers, playing the piano, twisting a loose string
in my pocket. my loving bear inside me. you put us
on your mantlepiece. say bell hooks three times into the mirror,
rhyme with thirty, start fires & let the world awake
to whatever makes the light light. you’re home, making love
as jean jacket, ancient oracle, apology, a ribbon of light, relief
on the other side. please come quick to the wolves. take me
to your stove, your writing space. chicago winds, stitch
the distance between us. believe in god, who is a horse
& draw them. forgive you, grow your hair to the moon,
wait for ravens, take a picture. the body will hold it.
