Bookmark (a thousand fair suitors)

A thousand fair suitors all stab at your heart
Those poets of movement and jockeys of art
The high-volume vendors who hustle romance
Splashing their canvas with color and dance

The blasters of trumpets, gold banners unfurled
They offer lush gardens in glistening worlds
Yes, bearers of torches and carvers of stone
Who whisper their sonnets, surrender their thrones

And there in your doorway, no shadow is cast
No lingering voices or ghost from the past
Just a cluster of walls and a window of pain
Collecting the heartache like droplets of rain

Still I stand before you with palms to the sky
No gold in my pocket, no thorn in my side
And all I can offer where words have no place
Is a body that trembles and this love that awaits

Jeff Kurfess, 1998

Seconds

The stranger curls beside me
Body naked for the dance
I'm longing for redemption
From this treason of romance

She asks me what I'm thinking
But these words will never do
And I can't begin to tell her
How much I lost to you

Jeff Kurfess, 1999

ever after all

The spaces stretch between us in these years of slow decay
Till every road I travel finds me searching for your face
If eyes have gathered wrinkles, I can still recall your grin
Through an ever-fading laughter that I never thought would dim

These remnants of our days enshrined have now returned to dust
They're sifting through the fingers of the only hands I trust
I no longer walk beside you, I can't help you through the vines
Yet I've learned to thank the Maker for each treasure you may find

These pages of hereafter, filled with countless broken rhymes
They're gusting through the ages, briefly passing through our time
In this waning of a season, with the Autumn closing in
I wonder who you think of when you feel the summer wind


Jeff Kurfess, 2005

misread

It’s been a mighty upset
Since our love was overthrown
The nights have lost their valor
And Gibraltar’s turned to stone

The suitors slung their arrows
Drove their daggers through the mist
I stood there in the fallout
With your letters in my fist

The pages scattered softly
Dying petals to the wind
Drifting off in earnest
Where your words had never been

Jeff Kurfess, 1998

Black

Black is my wallet
Black are my shoes
Black are the reasons
For the things I do

Black is the rhythm
Black are the blues
Black is the feeling
When I dream of you

Jump a little higher, honey
Jump through the hoops
Dance a little lighter
When I reach for you

Black is the motive
Black are the crimes
Black are the reasons
When I close my eyes

Jeff Kurfess, 2004

Trespassing

Streetlights on like clockwork
The night was creeping in
Another step from where you are
And where we might have been

My faith, so light and fragile
Soft rising through the air
Chasing rays of daylight
Dropping shadows of despair

Stranded at the crossroads
Of a thousand yesterdays
The ghost of beauty beckons
But her eyes, they turn away

Darkness falls around me
As I fumble for a light
Take a drag, brace myself
And step into the night

Jeff Kurfess, 1997

Back Spaces

Gazing out my window
I thought of yesterdays
The faces and the gestures
And how the laughter fades

Wondered if you’re happy
Or if you found your way
From long nights in November
And the promise that we made

Jeff Kurfess, 1998