We claim women we deem beautiful
We steal pebbles from the Earth herself
We pluck roses from their homes
And display their deaths in ours
Beauty without possession is still
Beauty
But our covetous hands crave more

relax
take a
deep breath
feel it
in your chest
fill the chambers
around your
heart
step outside
let it go
all of it then
count the stars
remember the
Sun
is just
one
of billions
You
Beautiful
Intricate
Spectacular
are
one
of billions
take another
deep breath
let it go
all of it

They say the heat melts you
Not her
To suggest anything to do with a liquid
Would be to lie
No
She evaporates you
Slowly takes from you and
Distributes to the universe.

She never means to destroy
But how can she understand
You lack her conviction
Her ability to withstand fire
To dance in it
Should she stop burning so brilliantly
Because you cannot endure
Her warmth?

She burns
She does not mean to be
But she is alone.

You have no tears
Volcanos pockmark your skin
Scars left behind the turmoil that was your soul
Every once in a while
The universe still throws something your way
An asteroid
Anguish
Your skin craters
But your core unmoves

The volcanos no more erupt their fury
The veins no more bleed
Can something wrung dry still freeze?

Sometimes I cry out
Searing pain where my other lung used to be
Heart is the cliche but she still beats
Breathing on the other hand has become laborious
Longing muscles and unrequited joints
Are all that remain of what was
They say to use a mirror
To imagine you still there
To lessen the pain
I do

In every reflective surface.

She tucks away in his garage
Tarp-covered beneath a film of dust
Coveting herself, her past
Her gleam diminishes before the envious eyes of

No one.

This poet's a know it all
But you know it's not all
It's cracked up to be

Hopeless romantic
Or hopelessly pedantic
The syntactics
not important at all
She

Selects each word with precision
With its connotation
And her vision
Soldering it to her others
Delicately

Awaiting an audience
In a world who no longer reads
They nestle in their subtlety