From the tips of my fingers,
coated with a soft ivory key,
You blossom.
Flowering outwards
Like the tail of the salmon
Stark against the foamy white rush.

And suddenly it stops.
As I lift my hand,
the pearl that congealed at the tiny mouth
Slowly slides from me,
Leaving a ruby trail as he
chases something I cannot see.

His door winks at me.

Tethered with a flimsy cage of marrow,
I sit, stand,
Padded with a layer of softness.

And the things that seem too real
Every germ, bug,
every word that penetrates me
that wiggles through my pores
I cannot stop them,
I cannot hold up my arms and scream
"Take me!"

I can only lay still as they lift my lids
Infiltrators tugging my lashes
The familiar sloshing as they march through my eyes,
ankle deep in the wet jelly
that guards my dreams

And I blink twice but they're already in
they're broken through
They've set base in my retinas
Looking out from the inside,
Pointing in awe at my star freckled fear.

Lathering languity,
I watch the clishmaclabber trip
and stumble over your teeth.

The shimmering floss is wound
deep within your pit,
Pulled and worked with every
Flick of your tongue.

They came crawling
From their fiery womb,
Dragging milky bodies
With puckered hands.

Slowly, they discovered their legs.
Wobbly and soft,
They were not strong.

Learning to press their feet
To the needle padded ground,
They slowly rose
One by one,
Stark like bone against the night sky.

They saw themselves in the trees
Little gold moons that watched them, unblinking
They were their mirrors.
They saw themselves,
They knew they were free.

Slowly, they stumbled forward
A foot in front, a foot in back,
And the flames reached out to pull them back in.
They did not see
They did not stop.