even amidst fierce flames the golden lotus can be planted*

to sylvia plath

dear sylvia softness i feel, firm in my bones
i stand like crooked smile my lips wear everyday
everyday, every day is madness to death, to resurrection and back to the start until you find something new
tender and kind i cannot talk, lump in my chest and head
fingernails are just as boring as eyelashes, they cannot be ugly
unless you are more than 'just sad'
i dream of a place full of rainbows and plants
dear sylvia
the smell of grass that casts darkness away
but actually it's ocean that makes the nights bearable
dear sylvia
dear sylvia saltiness made of quiet tearless cries
let's just let go
dear sylvia drown in the blue of the soul
accept the universe seeps to your flesh and drown
drown until there's nothing left to remember
dear sylvia
where the home is
that's where the home is

You say things like:
"Caw caw!" and "llamo"
with a hard L

As a statement
you ask: "You my baby?"
Despite the holes in my body

Our shared presence a chaotic
good and I, beside myself, at your
"We love each other, don't we?"

There was an Old Man with a poker,
Who painted his face with red oker
When they said, 'You're a Guy!'
He made no reply,
But knocked them all down with his poker.

I remember somewhere
in the depth of your lake-like eyes:
fresh ropes, high places, warm walls.

Everything I've tried to recall
from the comfy, tender-looking voice
still floating like clouds below the scorching sun.

I imagine so: you
are more than a metaphor of poetry,
more than a life in your body, you

are a son lost in your own prophecy.
I now know how a mother must feel,
how a mother must feel about the fruit of the womb.

These blue-green petals of your existence
softly wrapping my fingers and sloppy neck;
it is almost as if my skin is precious.