a stern distance. though softer maps. the same lost. in blunt bruises and soiled confessions.
the capacity for change stalls at her.

time is a cruel auditor. part virus. part vaccine.

the ocean has its grey. the sand has its red. distance like any predator stalks, then kills.

the particles. the unseen engine. candy-coated poisons in a sea of apologies.

the various shores. the curious islands we're willing to call home. long roads around water. steep inclines against the wind. a lazy math of conditions. a flawed psychology of inference. capitulating flesh unashamed.

the mountain is small. but the slope of it is sharp. the climb is ignorant. the downhill is wise. gravity always listens. time is usually deaf.

we follow the path.  letting nowhere find us. naively dropping our breadcrumbs. imagining they will be enough. to find our way back.

the soft carousel. quenches its parched sentiment. in overt ghosts and empty hauntings. the atoms pretend. small gods manipulating the larger.

touch is medicine, but not a cure.

a vague compendium of doubt. a trembling thigh of certainty. in the shallow scrape of open doors against love's careless wind.

flesh evolves. from want. hungry and loud.weighed down by these bones. betrayed by its patience.

the distance unfolds. tissue paper in the fist of gravity. the journey surrenders to the war within.

her eyes closed as she coasts down that hill. all her allegiance lost to broken ladders and blind demons.

the sharp edge. the tender corner. tangling their puppets.

these are the long roads. shimmering pin points on the horizon. shy wolves hiding behind their fangs.  the yellow noose. the pink discipline. broken darts and empty glasses at the bar. a desert of faces. all eyes and scabs. no voice.

these are the subtle winters. that never seem to end. bloody fishhooks in the shallow water. the spooling ethics of the hunt.

the future has its funeral. dirty claws in the meat. the smiling corpse. the abundant infection of when.

tepid surrenders. the simple suicides of touch. naive emperors drowning in their robes. distance has its advantages.

the rotting apple dares its song. memories of that first bite impossible to ignore. the hungry rider swallows the miles. content to have gone too far.

the frail twig beats the wind. searching for a song.

a seldom war. a constant enemy. the stringent paradigms flesh imposes upon its mortgagees. all satire and betrayal in the most stunning of suicides.

the soft corner. the weight of the shadows as the angle's grip tightens. learning. the frequency of the void. the gentle sting of gravity. ripe with a static of falling.

the room. a kiss. a stale surrender. anxious atoms on their violent path to division.

a brief conflict. the moist of her thighs and the sere of her lips. she wanders. lured by freedom. smothered by distance.

gone too far. always. searching less than finding. the anxious roads that let her bleed. dull needles suckling an already empty vein.

the slowly opening bridges that give way to the tall boats. the quiet lies that convince us to let those strangers in. it's just the wind. stirring its cauldron of spells. it's just life commiting to the edge.

maybe the colors stutter. maybe the words stumble. all truth is the trajectory of alone divided by the velocity of skin.

we are all questions drowning in the mechanics of choice.