You are the morning ray
into my dreaming eyes
I enjoy you every day
as my early sunrise

You are the blooming flower
in my teeming garden
I delight in your scent
as the adoring bees

You are the gentle shower
on my yearning skin
I cherish your drizzle
as the green leaves

You are the moonlight
in my dark night
I relish your surging tide
as the ocean waves

You are the bright star
in my broken sky
I love you so much
more than anyone else

Seeing how often you minimize our relationship,
you can’t blame me for thinking us into nothing

They eye me the way I once
did you, reminders of red wines paired
with seared cuts,
sugared plums, spiced ***,
and saccharine frosting
whipped to delicate peaks.

They are stringy and shiny
with bulging green bellies and
for a moment I imagine them
bursting free from their pods and
spilling into the aisle—shining like
wet eggs under the fluorescent lights.

White-knuckling the cart and chin just
high enough to gaze at the produce
from the corner of my eye, I push
past, I push on, I push away from

You know I can see you watching me,
you’d said that night when I tried the same
move on you, voice like a snake
and mouth red with merlot
you moved to me and you whispered
your song; eyelids flitting like moon
dusted moth wings, and guilty, wet
heartbeats blooming across our faces—

In another aisle now I release
my breath. Ribs unfurl like sails and
nothing ever happened.

I never called you back.
Symphonic excursions and gourmet
paranoia ceased, and as time moved on,
so did I.

But I will never cook with fava beans again.

Now here you come again to fetch me from the sea,
Ballast in my bones, this girl was born to sink;
A cautionary tale, I slip between the wood,
Limbs whittled thin and feet stained with soot.

But never-mind the waif; she waxes so pale
Drunk on dejection, I ponder the veil
Leaden and listless, for the sirens will sing:
Amaranthine is the color I bleed for the sea.

So I’ll spit out my sorrows wherever they listen,
Pumped me with pills and said that they fixed it.
The darlings have died off; the dolls are all broken,
Just left is me, thin-skinned and soft spoken.

And I’d rather lick knives than chew on love’s gristle,
Like a dog on a chain, I’d run when you whistle.
Far from it now, yet lost in the maze:
Chasing ways out for the rest of my daze.

i lay down
at your feet
and roll
over
like a
cowed
dog

anything you
want to take
from me is
already gone

when it hurts
it stings all
over

and i cry
because
i wish it
could start
hurting again

i can’t tell when
i’m being kicked
down

i can’t tell
anyone
how i feel

there is no magic
in waiting

there is no magic
in leaving

i sit at the door
in hopes that
someone will
walk through
and save
me.