Discretionary Love

It’s 12 degrees the night air slices through my sweater my teeth chatter. Standing in the lot fetching my cell phone from the glove box

Clever, witty, Tennessee man, moving to NYC to come out at age twenty-five, earn a living, explore gay life, come into your own. Computer geek,

“The eventual heat death of the universe that scientists love to talk about is already well underway…”–Don DeLillo, White Noise At the bottom of the

His very first attachment object – or so he was told by daddy dearest – that he took to bed with him each night, that

You were in my heart before I knew you were there, before I recognized you, a seedling strewn on the forest floor, ready to flourish

Spiraling touch           With the pinky of the cosmos Epiphany in energy      seeping from your flesh      

Bags filled He left She wailed An empty closet An empty dresser An empty heart And then Little by little She filled the empty spaces

Our breathing became harmonized as our mouths collided into omission  Reminding me of the time your fingers brushed against my skin during a drunken dusk 

A new cry in the air. A bird saying a new thing or a new bird. Such familiar unfamiliarity hanging in the air, once and

Long ago, long ago in that new aquarium we met by chance. Each of us had habits we carried from before to keep from going