why do i always feel
like my chest is caving in
i stopped breathing a long time ago
every exhale leaves me empty
every inhale collects dust
the base of my spine cracks
like the spines of old books
and like old books i too am heavy
i too am quite a burden upon your bones
but please please i swear
my chapter titles are written
in gold calligraphy

I love you as a deer loves the embrace of sun-dappled groves,
      An oak the earth, a robin the nesting crooks of leafy branches.
This love comes naturally.
You keep me grounded, and give me a home in which I am free to grow, entangled in you.

I love you as an eagle loves the lifting currents of the wind,
      A dolphin the waves, the tides the pull of the circling moon.
This love comes naturally.
You give me strength, the courage to strive to be a better person, not tomorrow, but today.

I love you like a lion’s roar echoing across the savanna,
      A moonlit kiss, Olympian gold glittering in the eyes of a cheering crowd.
This love come naturally.
You awaken my passion, stir my hearts’ depths unlocking feelings I’d never knew existed, till now.

I love you like no one I have loved before,
      And for reasons singularly different
      Than I will ever love again.
You are my rock, my muse, my fire.
I have never loved anyone
      So naturally.

Lay me down
      in those fields  
         of silken flowers
        where the buzzing
        over our heads
       whirls us into
   lightspun holy
my dress a metaphor
for loneliness
as you lift it off
and let it disintegrate
into the evening's
electric ether
your lips
    undoing the tight
       leather laces
        that have held my
     heart in place
until now
Now.
undo them
   in unfurled totality
let my feminine essence
drip, in non-verbal words
onto your fingers
let my elements
   light you up
    from within
firebrand sunset
in molten metallic sheen
indigo lip of ocean
melding into crackling
            hiss of earth
               and humming
                   under this
                dark rich loam
              tiny vibrating buds
     sprout from fossils
trilobites become
hazy with new moss
seething insects
lay eggs and spawn
feeling the bloodpulse,
that simmer of surface
in slick magnet energy
Curled stems of wild
poppies and zinnia
tie down my wrists
snake around my thighs
clasp my
tender-***** ankles
as if to open me
up even more
than I thought
            my soul
                   could go
and I do not resist
for soon they will
accompany you
as you decorate my
deepest womb
              with blossoms          
filling me with your
soul's seed
your musk-scented fervor
nestled, subaqueous
into the root of
my sweet
       deep
of  
  need