i could sleep for a thousand years

with your hair draped around me in swaths

a black frame for the pale pictured skin

like a set stage for the theatre in your eyes

i could stare for a thousand years into the sea

were it not for your smile to distract me

the waves, lapping and rolling in the mist

hold nothing to your tongue, tenderly slipping between your lips

red velvet curtains for the cinema in your smile

i would pray for a thousand years

and prostrate myself in the house of the lord if

i believed that god had made you mine

instead i pray to the temples behind your hair

bookends for the library in your mind