My memories are portraits;

mine and mine alone to paint

and how the blades of grass shimmer

on the patch-work front lawns

along the avenues of my hometown,

oh how they glisten

in the cleansing mist of suburban sprinklers.

How crisp are the scarlet leaves

that flounce and sweep,

flounce and sweep,

across graying autumn streets

when the trees strip to skeletons

before they can sleep.

How softly do the snowflakes descend

in winter's holy silence,

cascading down from heaven

to spiral and sink

through the glowing veil of city lights.

What lilting echoes of laughter

skim across every sacred inch

of this nostalgic landscape.

These memories are portraits;

mine and mine alone to paint,

to polish, gloss, illustrate.

For with every stroke

of my subconscious brush,

I only make the pain of what has passed

all the more precise

all the more lush

I am a masochist of an artist,

filling the halls of a museum

that is mine to explore with swooning melancholy.

The more vivid the colors I invoke,

the more palatable a poison

for my eyes to taste.

And when the years pass by,

when the sweetness becomes too bitter

for my aging eyes,

these portraits will be a bonfire

spilling smoke across the sky.

And when the ashes of my vanity

cloud and cover the sun,

it will be dark enough for me to sleep,

dark enough to drift and dream

until I am undone.