in the kitchen, we slice tomatoes.
It's like a poem, the glint of the knife
sliding through firm flesh, the thuk as it
hits wood once and again and again defining
the rhythm of the afternoon. Sometimes
there is sun through the window and
the room is warm with it. There is cheese
and olive oil and basil and you.
Nothing more is needed.

Following on from chameleon:

Tornado Alley

Nothing more is needed.
The window collapses on itself,
blown in as the twister rumbles through
and makes a blender of our lives. If you
hadn't made me move here, I might still be
alive, making love somewhere undisturbed,
the only twisting happening between another lover
and me on sheets that would barely ripple
in a still afternoon even if the window
had been blown in on us. Nothing more
is needed, you don't have to say anything --
it's not as if Tornado Alley was anything new to us anyway.

tony that's mean. hard last line like that hahaha.

from tony's last line:

it's not as if Tornado Alley was anything new to us anyway
though the way you keep coming back here
makes me want to rename it Monsoon Highway.
Yes, the way you predictably come and go
and never fail to leave behind flash floods
I never even bother to prepare for
despite the warnings.

Just know that though I always seem
to pick up and rebuild after,
one day I won't.

From Rax's piece:

one day I won't
but today I do
another breath has left me
and yet another has come
life's rhythmical reminder
that we all live
now
tomorrows breath is todays hope
today i hope for tomorrows breath

from hotstuff:

today i hope for tomorrows breath,
once I resurface after swimming
from my dreams to yours,
breathing through your lungs,
stealing memories, ones
I could never own.

from Rax:

I could never own that walk,
the hip-swinging confidence
that turns a step into a stride
eats the ground and commands
every eye to follow in her wake.

There are days that I can borrow it,
try it on for size, but there is always
the suspicion that everyone sees me
for what I am, a little girl
stumbling through life in mommy's high heels.

following Cham:

stumbling through life in mommy's high heels
it never looks as half as good as it feels
I wonder if I've got the hip-swing right?
I don't think I'll make a real transvestite

following LFN:

I don't think I'll make a real transvestite,
wear my heart in fire-engine heels,
and still walk straight, head high.
No, every morning, before I put on
my acceptable black pumps,
I cup the soles of my feet and
feel the weight of regret at
what I could never be: proud
and comfortable with my identity,
unafraid of being packed away in
the labels that would make
anyone craven, shirking
inside their own closets.

following Rax:

Inside their own closets
skeletons discuss humans
inside their own closets
discussing those skeletons
inside their closets - who's coming out?

from LFN

inside their closets - who's coming out
to listen and look for those little voices,
those pleas for time passed on
from generation to generation
into the silence assailing every parent's fear.
The blood's backstreets and alleyways
lead inside their closets, where later
they will find the shadows
of their children
playing hide and seek.

From Rax:

Playing hide & seek as I seek the perfect hide;
Is it love or lust that I feel inside?
Could it be both? Or maybe it's neither.
The giver & receiver of this emotional ether.

Are we friends, platonic, without attraction?
Or friends with benefits, seeking mutual satisfaction?
Why can't we have all of the above?
A friendship with trust, lust & love?

Isn't this fun? Some great stuff emerging here, I think. Really breaks you out of your own patterns/ruts.

from RAX:

playing hide and seek
with emotion
makes finding you hard
a game you learnt as a child
pefected as an adult
is now pulling us apart
at the mental seams.

Haha beat me to it oldschooldetroit

A friendship with trust, lust & love?
isn't it too but just the mythical fluttering
of the famed peace dove?

from tekay (someone stop me from writing so much... i need to get back to my boring books lol)

At the mental seams
you and I were conceived,
(stitched from the longing
of empty arms)
souls joined at the hips,
grinding against each other's need
to be. Above the bed lies
its parallel line (contract, horizon, point of rest)
where we discover how we were never
supposed to meet in this illusion
of a future woven into
our past-entangled arms.

From Rax

Our past-entangled arms,
heavy with the burden of all our sins,
the tiny hurts we can't forgive.
We should let them fall, free these
still good hands for giving
one more tender gesture.

One more tender gesture
from a stranger passing by

may be all that is needed
to hang a fallen dream
back high into the sky

* coughs HALLMARK CARD! coughs*

RZS wrote:

one more tender gesture.

one more tender gesture
where's the genie baby?
one more tender gesture
I reach round and rub your clitoris

i reach round and rub your clitoris
my breath a dragon at your neck
your hand on my thigh
with nails digging trenches

mayo wrote:

with nails digging trench[e]s

with nails digging trenches
this hurried scurry must persist
got to keep moving; worms to find
dynamite to avoid
dig dig scratch scratch
who said:
living is easy with eyes closed ?

from mayo:

with nails digging trenchs
five rows in readiness for propagation
sweat tingling
goose bumps waking the farmer

lordfuznut beat me to it and wrote:

living is easy with eyes closed ?
open planning could be an answer;
he suggested to agree to disagree
shrugging nonchalantly she picked up the glass of vodka

shrugging nonchalantly she picked up the glass of vodka
and threw it across the room.
if that is what it took to get his attention
then let the shattering sing!
their cat, always looking for an opportunity,
leapt from the high bookshelf
to lick the liquor clean.

from mayo:

to lick the liquor clean.
feline befuddlement
seized the moment!
a cat's eye view of lover's embrace

from mayo:

to lick the liquor clean
or was it that liquor licked her,
clean knocked her senseless
less sense meant more feeling
and she was reeling in it now
on her knees at his feet
arms and cheek and breasts
and heart exposed for
the desperate hungry whore for love she was