i'll spare
    the kick-drum
your overturned ashes,

      your northern         spaces:


these

   clouds will
      congregate—

these

     chemicals will
        whirl round and round.

I can talk to trees. The secret, you see, is listening. Go ahead, try it

sometime. Quiet your mind and focus on the rhythm of the world

around you. When you look for it, the heartbeat of the earth is very

easy to hear. Press your palms against the bark and focus on the way

the wind flows over and around everything, focus on the way the

grass and flowers push up to reach the sun, focus on the way the tree

breathes in the air around it. I can see the tree's memories of weather

and growth; the stillness reflects my own. If the tranquility was a

color, it would be the flush of a cheek coming in from the cold; if it

was a sound, it would be the lazy hum of a bee in summer; it if was a

scent, it would be sweet, like springtime flowers.

i am everything you need:

anchored,
linear along this dais—

red, dying.

there is no reconciliation.
we're bleeding like paint
in the rain—
wilting flowers
colourless in
our greys.

sometimes your eyes
double, your words
curl my cheek, still lingering
to brush stray strands.

i'm open inside out;
when you turn away
i know the hinges are closing.