Orpheus

My mother warned me of boys like you
In gaijin clothes
Jeans and leather jackets
And slicked back hair
But I had already written my fortune on your heart
fastening time to your scars like a lithograph
I knew this would be the season of my life
That the cherry blossoms would herald in my becoming
That those still nights
Spent sipping the stars
Were not in vain
That you would be waiting
Beyond the corseted days
Stitching silence to sound
Silence
That speaks itself
Hoarse
That shouts in its solitude and sadness
That beats like a drum
Against my temples
And you
The portrait of you
Sketched so vividly
In colours bright
Clung to my retina
Burnt to my brain
Your fateful force
An oncoming bullet train
My lips shut tight
To the knowing
Of light
And the crystallized ember
Burning like a torch
In your chest
Brilliant
And beguiling
Cut through me like a cello chord allowed to soar
Vibrantly vibrating
And the drum was my heart
And the music your hands
And your smile
The song.