I made sure to /bruise/ your neck before you'd left me- your choker tattoo, compliments of cupid. I'd !******! and !!******!! and !!!******!!! but none of you had come out. I'd gnawed^.^. for your blood but my lips had burst and I'd been left with my own. With unflinching ease, you neatly grabbed me by the teeth and bent bone from gum.

Needless to say, no lesson was learned.

I, the earth, have been neglecting my soils

//

I still skip stones
across your ocean—your foaming white
cut from the butterfly vine
flips the beached fish
into the definition of liveliness
takes to the sun—a pearled pantina of ocean rain
connecting my nose and mouth
into the rainbow vision
of your thin lips mending the
the maimed crab’s claw

this is how I will always think of you
my wishing well babe
neck-deep in sand
the butterfly vine entering your mouth
pulling your tongue to say
those three words aloud
finally, like you mean it
like I want it, the ocean tide
bathing my ankles

The devil has been in my bed-
Shouts with loud eyes, cures sickness with teeth that keep growing,
Licks my neck.
*
I have been away from home for too long, I
dream of rivers, of fathers with soft voices, of magic,
Where skyline and city puddle together with twinkling light,

where no one's afraid of the dark.

Storm-girl says today's a bad day,
rolled out of bed too late
(I guess),

she still prefers green bananas,
likes to paint with skin for canvas

what i mean is
skin-peel, nothing's real,
how dare they tell me how to feel.

Mornings bring [aches] that
don't go away with time, nights are
restless limbs, cold fingertips. Your lips^-
sunrise. Exhale. An existence of perpetual
sleep, yet I fear to close these eyes
lest your skin touch mine in dreams.
Pause. You'd think time would have
been enough to grow new bones (echo of
crunched snow, blooming sky), but you've been
hiding in the wrinkles of my
knuckles and laughing at me as I
stare too long at old houses, avoid
reflections, count the panes in my
bedroom windows again. Dear.
~
I will surpass you.