Michael Balili
LIMERENCE OF MOTHER-OF-PEARLS IN PEACETIME
I thought I could do anything for love until someone
asked Anything?
By mid-afternoon all the talents are gone,
we’d settle down
to contortionism & extraordinary memory
limited to naming
Asian capitals. You know stunts make me blush,
human cannonballs tickle me,
& plane maneuvers just isn’t enough with barrel
rolls, spins, & loops— I want the real deal
the entire stratosphere without a safety net.
I won’t sully
the inexhaustible rendition of metamorphosis
condensed into
geometric placement of crates. We kiss & the key,
cold & metallic moves from your tongue,
our breakneck pell-mell tethered at the back
of a dense velvet curtain & a million
vanishings. If it weren’t for your confusing
semaphore in the fog
I would have landed years earlier. If it weren’t
for your insomnia
I would have flâneured on high heels
in lahar. If it weren’t for your slight lisp
I would have entered the password
without brute force. The trade
winds shifting, drizzles & squalls,
soul weary, heart heavy, we’ll run
out of excuses to skip tikbalang weddings.
Look at the cosmos—whaleeye it—
I’m here aren’t I?