she rises like dragonsmoke to my nostrils

supplement the dosage with an hour of flat, gray sky over flat, gray water and cold spray wetting sun-dried skin as you cut through it like she cut through your heartstrings.

she is straight lines and shapes, diamonds and pentagons and triangles, flat geometry rendered 3D by the curl of her fingers.

I fell in love the way winter turns to spring -

one day, frosted grass crunching underfoot, and the next, black soles turned yellow from a sea of pollen

And the silence is breath-taking,

to the point that I am running numb fingers along

the lifelines

of my

palms,

pushing bangs back like I want to push your

spine,

vertebrae curving beneath leaden

Our bones are slipping where we move in quicksilver pools:

molten sighs steam in shiver-chill air 

and the skulk chases our breath.

(vulpine eyes witness our fall.)

Our bones are melting where we tremble in wildflower beds:

we are the Luna and Sol of disgraced dawns, 

and of morning moons,

we shift in time.

(the skulk shake tired heads

and count our murmurs.)

Our bones are shaking where we stumble through narrow dreams: 

the worlds of giants chuckle in our ears

like unteachable languages. 

raw:

like fucking or purple-red bruises  on your hip bones.

raw like the memory of a forgotten people, the ink stain on history's drying pages.

raw like the time you scratched yourself because raw was better than numb.

quiet:

like eraser dusks and saguaro sunsets or cricketless nights.

quiet like forgetting your own name, the absence of moons where words choke.

quiet like the time you stood underneath  the flow of water and rocked against waves between your legs.

dark:

like nightmares or your room when the lights flicker out.

dark like smiling through seven deadly sins while tribes fall to heroes' deaths.

the closeness of bodies, skin to skin to skin to skin,

and lips pressed against the cradle of shoulder and neck,

all wet heat and breathlessness, 

make up for the mornings

pale horses keen in your chest,

moving like strands of ghoststuff from rib to rib and through your cavities: