Valentine Carter - In Lieu of an Argument

**In Lieu Of An Argument** An insta-poet machine. [[Start here->start]]

it is not entirely in character for you to take bone china cups and crush a fine dust from them, much like the coating on the wings of chaotic butterflies, unaware of their destructive potential, only wanting to [[go about]] or [[stay at]]

go about their business, like you, wanting to be be sure of the sequence of reactions and certainty of connections [[between]] or [[fizzing]]

between so many disparate points, but I am not sure of the relationship between one moment & the next, or of [[the possibility]] or [[the certainty]]

the possibility or impossibility of a future in which your skin & all its fragility is no longer close to mine [[& in which]] or [[but held]]

& in which you do not speak, only struggle to process the unpredictability of a hurt feeling or wounded pride [[& in which->& in which 2]] or [[& in which->& in which 3]]

& in which I cannot follow your thoughts, because love is not artificial or intelligent, at least not the [[way it lives]] or [[kind that dances]]

by Valentine Carter [[start over->start]]

stay at peace, like you, camouflaged amongst the foliage, hidden from lazy eyes roaming indiscriminately, flitting [[over]] or [[between]]

over details and relevancies, but I am not sure enough to say that when you are hidden from me you are not lost to [[me]] or [[me|me 2]]

the certainty of an us, of our proximity to the shuttered spaces beyond words, in which there are blistered sensitivities [[nursed]] or [[& in which]]

nursed like medicinal brandy, moving us back towards home like the long shadows thrown by the low winter sun across [[frozen fields]] or [[a quiet street]]

frozen fields too hard to thaw, but for all that only waiting for the spring and the green, for what is broken to be [[mended]] or [[lost]]

mended, like a delicate thimble filigreed with kintsugi [[the end]]

a quiet street, houses hunkered against the foggy dimness of dusk, the loved and loving inside like coins in a piggy bank [[saved]] or [[heavy]]

saved for a rainy day, makings warm promises for tomorrow [[the end]]

lost, discarded like the memory of learning to walk [[the end]]

heavy with waiting, like the pause after that first I love you [[the end]]

way it lives at this moment, like a bright invention [[the end]]

kind that dances, like the needle on a geiger counter [[the end]]

but held apart, separate, or perhaps bundled up and kept safe like delicate green crops, late to harvest, that struggle on [[frozen fields]] or [[despite]]

despite the warning of the thermometer, reaching past the equinox towards the dead of winter, patient and [[heavy]] or [[determined]]

determined, like the last star in the new dawn’s sky [[the end]]

fizzing across this space which opens up as if trying to speak but unable to find an answer to decide on, [[closes again]] or [[a path]]

& in which I overflow with words, as if they are the only adequate bandages, just so that you might be [[mended]] or [[kept]]

kept safe and dry, until day has wrung out the clouds [[the end]]

me, so I can only hover, caught in the razor jaws of a decision, in which there may be myriad humiliations [[nursed]] or [[& in which]]

me, that we will find our way even though I am stilled in this present through which we are both trying to wade, [[& in which]] or [[but held]]

a path through it all, through this deadened forest and this still hollow, in which there is a creeping dread [[nursed]] or [[& in which]]

closes again like a door against an invited guest, left out in a cold darkness, in which a hard frost is settling [[& in which]] or [[but held]]