Eye Sore

They’re not reflections, they’re windows.

Diamond thoughts set into heat haze.

You see everything.

The room with the book on the nightstand,

open

with the pages facing down and spine stretched,

cracked down the centre

and fragmenting out.

Like they’re trying to be reliable, transparent

but haven’t quite figured it our yet.

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Kip

When I see your face,

jaw slack and eyes closed,

beyond the beat of this moment

in a dimension all of your own,

I relax in the knowledge that

despite the chaos of eggshell mornings

and clay evenings,

you’re finally getting some rest.

Sugar Coated

Behind that sweet exterior,

painted, crafted, structured:

a persona loud and clear.

 

I can see you.

See how your eyes do not reflect your

bright-red grin,

see how your long sleeves lift

to reveal silver filigree

around your wrists.

 

But whenever anyone asks

how you are,

you tell them you couldn’t be more fulfilled.

Everyone’s social media blares out their happiness –

so you have to keep up,

don’t you?

Observations of a face

Each muscle works to form an expression,

a twitch of the mouth on one side forming a half-smile

that exposes your teeth just enough to lightly rest the backs of your fingers against them;

pensive as always

staring off into the distance or close inside your heart.

Sometimes your eyes are mild and calm like a quiet lake on a still afternoon,

but they can change in a beat

to intense as a great maelstrom threatening to swallow every ship headed its way.

Soft brows cannot hide the waves of emotion

threatening to crash forth;

only practice and willpower make them bow down.

And then those cheeks, always lifted in a grin,

but which only ache, wonderfully,

from a true smile.

Brush faces

A woman stands, eyes intense, hair

in an up do, silver but young.

Gold pins mask dark shadows.

Next, her friend, tall, drawn,

slender with even more slender neck.

Plain face, ruddied with exertion.

Then, to the right, one with haughtiness

etched on her nose and the arch of her brows.

Black hair neat, pearls about her neck.

On the end, mouse hair with soft brush,

thin mouth that has been long silent,

and eyes wide as they are sad.