grasping
clutching
ribs expand
over
frenzied
beating hearts
forcing amber sparks
through burning veins
you've turned my will
to fire
with your touch

i see triumph
in your eyes
as beleaguered souls take flight
their flame-lapped talons bear
our husks of memories
away from this destruction.

feather kisses on fevered wrists
courage on coal-smudged cheeks
I turn to you and learn to fly—
escape these smoldering ruins
like fledglings born again

trust in newfound wings,
our scars and burns forgotten
smoke and flames still in your hands
so let me hold them, let me soar

live in the sky again

I believed that I was done
wasting thoughts on you

but memory is relentless.

I was at home in the crooks of your arm,
tall above the root.

Our sweet-bark skin, new spring at hand,
trepidation rendered mute.

The earth succumbed to restless sleep
as I ebbed between your palms.

The moss and shroom a witness
to the wilting of our psalm.


But the story the crow told me,

is the only one he knows:

like the morning sun you come,
and like the wind go.

I want to be
in a flesh warm home
with walls the color
of bone.

One of the homes
where ugly is kept
'neath fresh white faces

and all that lies
'hind lily frames
inevitably erases.

I've learned to submerge
in sparse droplets of
your scent and skin

I let them melt on my tongue
so that they may sustain
my body for months

I will bathe in this for a moment
but your fresh wet scent
will linger


and I refuse to quench this thirst

though I know I'm going to drown.