It took me so long to learn
that being in love doesn't mean
holding tight to each others hands
so you both drown
its letting go so you can both swim to the surface
you are so light
like air for breathing.

she smelled
of quiet snowfall
at 2AM on Sunday.

she left me
some months ago
and I am still
washing her out
of my bedsheets

She tells me I’m beautiful
like the snow she’s seeing
for the very first time.
Her mouth opens to catch
some of the cold, and it
slides down her throat,
and I want to kiss her,
if only to steal the shivers
from between her teeth.

but instead, I stand on the
ledge in front of the library
and watch her eyes sparkling
beneath the streetlights
as the snow keeps coming down.

-- when I have the tenderness of a writhing dragon,
he will paint flowers across my throat

as though to remind me that fires are indelicate,
and that I writhe in a prison made of open space.
-- this man will not smother me with his skin
when we sleep.
-- this man will unhinge the door of my mouth,
and kiss out the bullets stuck under my tongue.
                                                                ­               ---
whatever thousandth day I awaken beside this man,
realizing I have become the flowers he painted
across my throat, by braving my throat,

I will, unchaining myself from the draconic worry,
bring him his coffee in bed, with a smile.