tears of men

you bare your storms to me

I lash against the currents
and you give me your back

foundations shift
did we not build
upon the stones

the pull of grains from the shore
where sails have failed proud ships
their masts a heaving sigh
of grief and heavy waters

I sip at your drowning
and break over you

crash on heaving shoulders
where there is no salvage
from the bone littered depths
of fathers, sand and covenants
smashed in sick christening
against the fragile bow

abandonment wails on bipolar winds
that my woman's hands fall through
stumbling to gather frailty
aboard ghost ships of men
where the gravity of boys
haunt the very timbers

should my lips ever set the flames
we will scatter them
even from their rotting boards
the graves can claim their ashes
and we will tread beyond the pyre

I will give you my back
if you are man enough to bend me
and dwell in my heart places
where kisses are balm

and my love
will pour you into vessels

unshattered

H