Competition: Dreams in the Night

I am not a poet--
I am not my brother.
He deconstructs meter across multitude tongues, tracing back the very concept to its root.
I calculate meters in milliseconds.
My periods are bullet holes.
My sentences stutter.
I'm not a poet--
But all my other languages fail. I can't encapsulate what you mean to me
I can't tell you it all
I can't
My voice is a joke, it's disgusting, disgraceful, it's broken.
And my hands shake too hard.
The words aren't right.
Nothing I shape
My face won't move that way
You can't see it
I see it in your eyes how you don't understand
And how could you when I can't even speak?
I can't make words beautiful.
Not in this language, not in any secondhand or birth tongue.
But I need to tell you too much
There is so much in me from you
You. You. You.
I didn't dream before you, have I told you that?
The metaphor of it, as Jax may say.
He'd have a better metaphor.
This body would sleep and it would process and it would dream-- regurgitating information, files, memories.
Post-traumatic stress disorders and phantom pains.
I wake up screaming.
I break my skin to ground me back in the place I am from the places I am not.
But you
You are different
And you changed me
When we chose each other and so long before that.
I think I saw dreaming in your eyes.
So now I lie awake at night listening to your breathing and I dream of things bodies do not need or deserve.
I dream about holy things.
I dream that I get to keep you, because you have decided to keep me and to stay.
And I dream that we have soft days, that we will debate the color of our kitchen and you will cede to me because it is the kitchen, but when the gallons arrive I will have ordered whichever shade your gaze lingered on longest.
I dream the most feverish and unholy things too, too selfish to put to words. Arms shaping cradles and small designer shoes. Rings or ink or garlands. Promises.
I dream that I could live with you
More than this body and its histories.
I'm not some fucking poet.
I'm not my brother.
And I'm not what you deserve.
But I still get to lie awake and listen to you breathing
And fuck if that's not poetry.

From darkness, my eyes open with bright stars to greet.
And I'm no longer lost in slumber's comforting, heavy sheet
Wonder for this new world's secrets stirs within me deep
But a gentle touch on my arm reminds me of the heart I do keep
Her soft eyes and tender smile tear me free from mind-made seams
And once more I pray no end shall ever come to such living dreams.

Running, lost, unfamiliar scene
Chased by a persistent threat
Falling, peril, death is mean
Awoken in cold sweat