You had bad tattoos like these
You hadn't thought them through

Is that her, lit up by the colour I wore?

But by love, the oak trees writhe

Do you believe what you see?
Do you believe that you see?

He simplifies me,
Paper under his paper weight
Listening to those teeth which chatter

Here the magnolias came and went
I still had your bite marks in when you died: red over white, blue dents rising.
I’ll pay your rent
I’ll drink you in
I’ll light up our screens of memory
I’ll be that smaller girl
The one in your bed
a body in these systems of work and play

I am no one. I am no where. I have no one coming.

Turn this water into song

Equally
Make believe

He, on a dirt road that kept getting longer

She, under the covers of a violent room
Holding the pith and pits to her ear

Put her on repeat
Puppy tailed circles
Wrapped around wedding bands
They wake up to a golden hour
Every window washed with a river, a snake

here again
I prayed we'd be there
Four feet in serenity
My voice
Your voice

That I had skimmed my stone too far into the night

Chaos
Death
Dirt
the bottom of the ocean.
Challenged, difficult, naive.

Gentleness. Genesis. Listerine. Back to bed. Cry on the way home. Boys who swear. Swear they would literally do anything. I love you and it always has been that way. I feel the same. I know I was vulnerable. I found it. I got it. Such a beautiful thing.

Hope in sea shells.

having but denying
having nothing to do
(with such people)
always learning
(but never the truth)

of everything you wanted
of everything you had
of everything you placed, so gently, into the sink

watched it curl up
curl out
twirl
link

a rainfall, an echo, a star
some days you live in them, up there, too bright
three in a row

in silver,
sin, sun, Son
look at it, put it back on the shelf

I dreamt you were a missionary
Everything you weren't before and more
Loud and summarised

I saw you at my kitchen table,
I laughed at your jokes
Stuck in 16, stuck in this love
in a silver chain, keeled over