Stargazing at Noon

by Amanda Torroni

  FOR THE STARGAZERS

  THE DREAMERS

  THE ROMANTICS

  THE FANTASTS

  When you ask me, “Which star is ours?”

  I say, “All of them.”

  I have not been time traveling;

  I have been traveling through time.

  At night I close my eyes & dissipate into cloud atlas,

  band & billow noctilucent, then rearrange in rare pattern.

  What a beautiful way to break apart.

  A letter to my love, who must be lost at sea.

  Were most of your stars out? You forgot how to read charts. You circumnavigate the earth searching for a compass that works. On land there is a woman made entirely of ocean. Her heart is a storm. It beats against the metal hull of her ribs, r e l e n t l e s s.

  You think of her often.

  Were most of your stars out? The constellations are crooked. Planets no longer align properly. We are not magnetic.

  I’m running out of ways to explain what you mean to me.

  You’re gravity.

  You’re the sun.

  You’re the center of the universe.

  Shut up.

  Were most of your stars out? In love we become nocturnal, taciturn, we let our hands do all the talking, capsize every night in a sea of bed sheets, reaching for a body of water to drown in. You are not him.

  We will find each other as soon as our eyes adjust.

  Were most of your stars out? Yes.

  every.single.one.

  I. Full

  ANTIQUES & ODDITIES

  i.This morning E. E. Cummings broke into your

  home & stole your beloved typing machine.

  The keys got stuck. Your brain stopped working.

  Line breaks are another way to

  frac-

  ture the soul.

  ii.When the Cole Bros. brought circus

  carneys to Cape May they came with

  a heat wave

  shimmering gasoline vapor

  elephant dung

  & a man named Charlie

  whose eyes befriended my big cat tattoo

  while my own rode

  the s p i n n i n g

  carousel

  of his black teeth.

  iii.There are 7 billion people on this planet

  & they are all made of

  tree rings.

  PURPLE AVENS & PRAIRIE SMOKE

  There used to be meadows in our chests.

  We would walk among them pointing out

  the purple avens & prairie smoke,

  which are actually one & the same,

  but we weren’t botanists back then.

  We’d roll around fields of nodding flowers,

  nod off ourselves in tangled stems

  until dreamscapes broke into delicate

  red petals hiding beneath our eyelids.

  In those days we made love from concentrate

  & it was the sweetest thing you could ever taste.

  LOVE & LUNACY

  In 360 B.C.E. Plato wrote, “Love is a madness.”

  Modern science has since validated this claim

  with studies that show similarities occurring

  in brain events involving love & lunacy.

  Our romance is a chemical dance between

  dopamine, adrenaline, & serotonin.

  So when I tell you that every time I

  smell sandalwood on your skin

  hear your name from another’s lips

  feel your breath on my neck

  see your face, I’m a wreck

  because my brain lights up like a city at dusk,

  my veins all flood, the planets rust.

  & when I say I’m crazy,

  deranged, lovesick & struck,

  I’m not just making this up.

  My dear, these are all symptoms

  of the madness that is love.

  SMALL STEPS, GIANT LEAPS

  What are the lies you tell yourself?

  That it’s impossible, will never work,

  the pressure is far too much?

  That the space between us is galaxies

  we travel light-years just to touch?

  How quickly you forget

  we are astronauts.

  Our small steps

  are giant leaps.

  Just you wait & see.

  CANOPIC JARS

  The night you fell to your knees & whispered mythologies into the canyon curve of my hips, you were not careful. For days they echoed, carbon-steel pinballs bouncing around tender ligaments & bruising ribs. I have notcaught my breath since.

  Recall how the sky appeared a smeared blackboard of promises you never intended to keep.Bloodworms flooded from the earth, flounderingen masse unimaginable, ammonia-soaked. Stars

  d i s s o l v e d

  in a chalk dust clap of applause for featsthat meant nothing. At least not to me.

  We kept dried organs in canopic jars, unpeeled dusty strips of linen, wrappedhollow torsos in white gauze.

  In time we will become archetypes. Linguists will invent new words to describe the unprecedented ways in which we hurt.

  SPACESHIPS

  Tell me about the summer

  you shed your fingerprints

  & wrapped your palms

  in heart lines, tied them

  to the stars & swung.

  Tell me how the moon

  kissed your feet nude,

  about how our bodies

  became spaceships

  by evening & blasted off

  the heat of asphalt.

  Tell me you miss those

  shimmering nights

  guided by sky maps

  measuring the distance

  between our lips.

  I do.

  ON LOVE & FUTURISM

  Many nights passed

  in that fashion,

  bodies & lights

  wet with neon,

  blurred & abstract.

  Much like a futurist

  painting,

  we moved

  too fast.

  POP ROCKS & SODA POP

  We were electric that night

  the power lines collapsed

  & you laughed because

  our cell phones died

  & I, for the life of me,

  could not find a flashlight.

  There were plenty of candles,

  not a single match, &

  only the palest moonlight

  catching your skin

  through open windows

  as we listened to the winds howl

  the thunder clap

  the sky break

  the branches snap

  & we explored the storms

  that have long since existed,

  braved the blizzards within,

  traded breaths & tangled limbs,

  all of this until the winds calmed

  the thunder died

  the sky healed

  the branches sighed

  & we collapsed like power lines

  because we were electric that night.

  VIOLETS & VAGUERIES

  Speak to me in violets & vagueries

  like yo
u have a masterpiece

  buried in the roots of your teeth

  begging for extracting.

  Touch me with white pepper palms

  & fingers that move gingerly

  across my skin like it’s canvas

  for words you haven’t yet written.

  & when you grip my whalebone hips

  like rocks jutting into the Atlantic

  & when your knuckles turn white

  with odes not meant for the ocean

  & when the sky dims to witness

  fireworks burst from your mind

  know that the show is not over—

  that no moonbeam or starlight

  or chemical cocktail finale

  compares to basking in the

  limelight glow of your eyes.

  STARGAZING

  I wasn’t admiring

  the freckles on your skin;

  I was stargazing.

  & when I said I wanted

  to make love to you,

  I meant all of you.

  & when you felt my fingers

  tracing poetry

  over parts of you that

  were supposedly broken,

  know that all I saw

  were prisms, refracted light,

  & everything I wanted

  to make mine.

  BOTTLE ROCKETS

  How can I regret

  nights spent

  shooting stars

  like bottle rockets

  we were comet tails

  & tattered sails

  we haven’t

  loved like that

  since.

  THE EINSTEIN-ROSEN BRIDGE

  This is me in the past

  scolding you in the future

  for hanging hopes from vaulted ceilings,

  watching them dangle limp like so many

  d a s a s.

  e d t r

  This is me on the back porch

  barely listening

  to the Tree Frog Symphony Orchestra

  play in E major while we talk about

  minor ironies.

  Practicing paradiddles, s k i p p i n g stones,

  measuring distance with one eye [closed],

  staring down the throat of a black hole.

  If there is a bridge that connects your universe

  mine, you better believe I will find it.

  The Perseids fly on mobiles,

  astronomical fevers burning up

  & breaking into cold sweats.

  We count red flags & white flares,

  daydream what it would be like to sleep.

  THE BRIGHTEST THING

  I need you to know something—

  that when you’re feeling defeated

  beat up & down

  on your luck

  when you feel like you haven’t done

  anything or enough

  that the most important things in life

  cannot be built with your hands.

  & even on days you feel burnt out

  dim in the darkness

  lacking sheen

  I need you to know—

  you’re still the

  brightest damn thing

  I’ve ever seen.

  REDWOODS

  Three nights ago I dreamt we were redwoods, majestic & towering, in a wilderness dense with metaphors that coalesced in fog mist. Our love had grown slow like an old forest, names carved in heartwood, layers of bark thick as thieves protecting unnumbered invisible cities contained within your skyscraper trunk.

  I took the stairs down instead of up.

  There will be others, I know. They will come & admire the texture of your skin, your august boughs, hacking off pieces to bring home, leaving you exposed, soft & fibrous, red-brown, fleshly.

  Our limbs may never touch, but roots laid shallow & wide will tangle beneath the earth. Of this, I am certain.

  When I awoke the trees fell in my chest. I was left, wondering if a dream is all we’d ever be.

  WILD THING

  It is not a stretch to say

  your eyes are satellites,

  drawing everything in

  with cosmic light

  & sparkling curiosity.

  Last night you were

  the littlest cowboy,

  lassoing fireflies

  & kicking up stardust

  wherever you jumped.

  This morning you were

  the tiniest lion man,

  flipping your golden mane

  from side to side

  & roaring with delight.

  Tomorrow you will be

  no small wonder,

  a wild thing stomping

  footprints into the heart

  of anyone who is watching.

  MONET BLUR

  I’m on the train to Killarney

  shuffling through songs

  when your voice comes on

  thick with accent.

  I can’t see your face,

  so I keep staring

  at the Irish countryside,

  details lost in a Monet

  blur of greens that

  pop against gray skies,

  forehead against cold pane

  fogging up from lips

  too close to the window,

  now shower steam,

  flag falling

  like a towel

  around your feet.

  SANDSTORMS & MONSOONS

  I don’t know your laugh

  or the sandstorms that

  rage when you’re mad,

  escaping dust-filled lungs

  in dry, tired gasps. But,

  I know the way my name sounds

  coming out of your mouth

  at unearthly hours,

  humid,

  wet with monsoon,

  heavy,

  breathing that leaves me

  breathless. & I know, I know,

  more than anything, I know,

  the stars shudder like our skin

  across immeasurable distance

  as we bury our needs

  in each other.

  YOU CAN’T BLAME THE RAIN

  Your engine caught fire

  on I-95, exactly 30

  miles from home.

  I know

  because I’d been

  counting mile markers.

  I do that sometimes

  when there is just

  no sense in

  talking to you.

  The rain was a

  swirling mist & when

  you got out of the car

  you were a bear,

  arms high above your

  head, roaring that

  if only it were

  raining harder

  we wouldn’t be in

  this mess.

  That is always

  your logic—

  blame the rain.

  You, love, are

  without fault,

  arms above your

  head & all.

  But if you’re going to

  lose your mind today,

  then I will lose it

  with you.

  THE RIFT

  I did not notice the rift.

  It went something like this:

  one morning I awoke

  to find an unknown

  body of water between us.

  Suddenly we were

 
separate continents

  & I did not notice the rift.

  I’M SORRY, OKAY?

  I’m sorry for bodies I explored

  & lips I kissed that were not yours.

  I’m sorry I don’t know how to unlove or unfuck

  former flames, even more so for the embers still aglow.

  I’m sorry I can’t extinguish every thought

  that did not begin or end with how my curves

  fit into your contours.

  Mostly I’m sorry for running out of promises

  I haven’t already made before. But know this—

  all the love I can’t swear,

  I will show.

  II. gibbous

  FIVE MONTHS AGO

  Five months ago you sent a letter, & every day for the last five months I’ve checked the mailbox hoping it would come. Today, it finally came. Today, I stopped wondering what your air hand would say in its chicken-scratch calligraphy. I stopped imagining what your cologne would smell like, or if, after all this time, it would bring grapefruit apologies, peppermint remorse, & finish off by asking for deep cedar forgiveness. Today, I sat in my car with a swatch of red fabric from an old favorite sweater, soaked in the scent of you, closed my eyes & let the ocean tide pull of your soul bring me backward in time to five months ago. Five months ago, when there was no question that we were destiny, when nothing could come between what was always meant to be. My eyelids, overwhelmed by the swelling sea, could not keep their levee. Thoughts distended into daydreams, poetry you wrote about waking up hungover like swollen rain clouds & visiting our favorite coffee shop we don’t even know the name of yet. Reveling in silence, faces so close our noses touch, only breaking it when one of us finds something important enough to say. Today, I finally let go of the pain I’ve been harboring, finally got closure from that moment, five months ago, when the universe fell asleep at the wheel.

  LONG DAYS, MEANINGLESS NIGHTS

  Long days, meaningless nights.

  The tides come & go, come & go.

  Mostly, they just go, leave me

  standing on a starless beach

  alone,

  gazing into gunmetal seas

  searching for the glint & glimmer

  of hope.

  & the only thing I know

  is how far I am from the woman

  I want to become, the kind

  who doesn’t come undone

  when the waves get rough,