Vertebrae Melody

A Poem by Alice Beecher

Ignore the title.

when I grew up
I was not one of those people who are
terrified of loneliness
simply because
I couldn't be.
As I was already
so singular in my scraggly hair
in my face dripping with ink from the books
that stoked the hunger of my listless hours

now, though
now that I am with you
now that sometimes, when all the little factors coalesce
and it is safe to touch each other in the dark
I find that I am lonely more often
lonely because I do not know the words behind your gestures
or your hesitations
or the way your arms occasionally tense and shake and betray
whatever it is you won't tell me

because sometimes it is even worse when there is something to tell
when your tongue slips out of my mouth and into the air
and the words are jittery, caffeinated
and do not conform to the perfect lovely image
that I believe is you
you in your mysterious idealized form
but say simple things
like "I look worried because I'm a boy and your a girl and that's just all there is and I'm a teenager and we might get caught and I don't know (no, you just don't know what to say)"
and your words splinter into a thousand little pieces
and there is nothing in the air for me to latch on to
to hold as a keepsake in worse days
when discontent is solid and strong
no distinguishable ecstacy or sorrow to make
the sort of memories that are decisive
and tell me whether I love you or not

whether it is anything beyond the square glasses
and sandpaper chin
and well nit sweater
that I like about you, you and your cold car
and endless cacophony of records
and the kind words you whisper

to my skin
to the dark
to something we hope
approaches an infinite value.

but despite all this

(all this noise that has replaced the metered poetry of my thoughts)

i continue to whisper
to find ways to stroke your veiny hand at midnight
in the dusty backs of subarus
to run, run in desperate search for the finality
the satisfied thoughtlessness
they all seem to find in motion pictures
where the highest high waits in the body of a boy
as his limbs respond to the clenching of her trembling muscles.

And I, guess, this all means I do love a part of you
perhaps not for any quality you have
not even because
you are anything like me
(for what man would love himself enough to never want anything more?)
but simply because you are a human
and this is what I am made to do

as the structure of our crumbling, cardboard world collapses
turning to choas at every hairline fracture
because you, you and your eyes in the twilight
are my last hope
because if I have to die
in disease or in gunfire
I refuse to die alone.