Cumulonimbus

A storm, a prayer, a presence.

clouds, clouds, clouds
drifting, pulsing, watching—
an endless vigil
over our restless world.

I lie here naked
in stormy San Francisco weather,
thinking of you.
A Palestrina polyphony
drifts through the room:
layer upon layer of voices,
two or more melodies
circling and commingling,
like a slow, ascending prayer.

Memory returns me
to last night,
when you came to me
as pure energy,
softly pressed against my skin.

Now I binge on sacred music,
fast, kneel in pews,
serve strangers in the neighborhood—
anything to conjure
that ominous charge
of you.

Cumulonimbus clouds—
you’re like a cumulonimbus cloud,
a cumulonimbus cloud.
Cumulonimbus clouds—

I tell my friends, “I can’t see her,
but I feel her everywhere—
this bizarre mind-body energy thing.”
They say I’m crazy,
but who needs them
when I have an invisible lady?

You’re overhead,
more real than breath,
and in each pause—
between each chord
of Palestrina’s layered hymn—
I feel your current
pulling me into orbit.

Like intertwining spheres
of polyphonic harmony,
we fuck in thought,
we fuck in a lucid dream—
our bodies and minds
rising in a slow crescendo
until we’re one—
beneath the sun.

And I fast,
and I pray,
and I remain chaste,
just to get to you.