Sandstone, moonstone, soapstone

don’t flash like those eyes,

like motel signs at night.

Like dancing lightning strikes.

Fixed in place, you’re a patient stone soldier.

And with your finger on the trigger...

Honey, about time you took your gun out of its holster.

(Is love a kiss, a touch, a whim?

Or is it something more akin to hurricanes on deadly waters?

First the drizzle, then the storm.

I never rain, but oh baby, how I pour.)

Something invisible has snapped inside me.

A crueler feat catches, a hunger,

the hate between lovers.

An inverse of passion, the dangerous hope of laughing, the guttural cries, the face gone blanch.

(It's so like the ocean—for its mood to turn violent.

Slurred like the words of a drunken rampage.

Or perhaps lost, drowned in silence.)

The devil and God are raging within.

But rage is an art like everything else.

I do it, and I do it exceptionally well.

I do it because everything else already feels like hell.

I swear I am more wolf than woman anyway.

(You are that which the waves break against, and recede.)

Here I can’t help but wonder this version we’ve been given to play out with God’s rolling dice.

(You were the maid of honor to the death and rebirth of my life.

You caught my wrists.)

I’d curse you if you left me so unceremoniously, without even a glance backwards.

(The others did. I deserved a better goodbye.)

I wait.

You stay.

I don’t know why.

(I think our souls are very old friends.)

Why are you so sweet on me, huh?

I lay out

sparkling nectar spread

but I’m a poison to the blood, a nightshade sung cacophony,

made of staples and berries and mud.

What elicits your loyalty?

What calls you back to me—you, with your blushing halo so joyfully?

(And after,

with the shore torn asunder,

when all has gone quiet,

would you still feel love?

Would you be able to find it?)