Secret.

I want to tell you my secret, Mystique,

but you have to promise me you will not share it.

Because this secret is alive, it clings to your sleeves –

   every single day you wear it.

It sleeps under your pillow, you see; sometimes it follows you down the street,

     it slithers through your lungs every time you breathe,

       leaps out from your lips with every sigh of relief and

it keeps you walking, heaving, even when the hills are steep.

That doesn't sound much like a secret, you say,

if in fact it’s everywhere…

and I’ll tell you the whole world is made of secrets – they fly right by your ears,

    then through your hair.

So I know there are times when your minds are reeling

  under the piling files of time we’re stealing

     to keep your eyes peeled but your brains from peeling

        to keep your lips sealed that this is art we’re dealing.

I eavesdrop to watch your gears spin – trains and clocks smokin, tock-tickin,

inundate every wall you hit with waves that

 crash and glisten like champagne against a ship

   fresh-christened, I need a fix, but I want to listen.

How is it you make the air drip with harmony and rhythm?

I bear witness as it gets so thick can’t tell how far from me you’re sittin; 

  maybe the crowd is only a cloud – but behind them the sun has risen,

her rays reflect right through you with each note singing, once just written.

I want to drown in the ocean of your sound –

        it’s not enough to just bask in it.

I want to capture it in a locket, clasp it around my neck; wear a mask of it.

I wish I could bottle it up and flask it, sneak sips, get drunk off the taste of badassness;

gladly ask that your mallets and sticks be the nails that seal my casket.

I want to know what flows in the rivers down here

  that makes your blood so thick – always getting thicker;

want to know how it is I landed here and within minutes had brothers and sisters.

I want to know your secrets and

I want to see your teeth, Mystique.

I want to know what makes your eyes get bigger:

is your hunger for speed or is it for sugar,

    and where do you hide the trigger?

It’s as if each of you has a whip, used it to snatch the heart right out of my chest,

injected it with your essence, infected it with redefinition of that old word best...

then you festered, aggressively spread,

manifested in grins that cascade from within me; 

   waterfalls from my pen, words turned to eager plumes of smoke escaping chimneys.

You break onto that stage ablaze as if every day you wake pacing iron cages

   just waiting to bear your aching fangs and tear straight through their faces.

You stain the floor with their adoration

   as if you are the witch doctor – they, the patients.

You take the air and shape it into flames.

You make magic.

          And it is tangible, it is shameless.

You are addictive like nicotine, and you sell even better than sex;

If only you knew how I crave you, my sweet weekly cigarettes

in a patchwork world pieces seem stitched together with maybes, agains, and not-quite-yets.

Fighting for an idea that you cannot even see.

But it is there. You know it is.

It is enclosed within the beads that hang around each one 

of your beautiful necks.

Do you still want to hear my secret? 

  I think you may already know - 

      I am in love with you, Mystique.

And the best part is I am not alone.