there is a steady drip of blood
running down your chin onto the floor,
crouched in front of the
open fridge like an animal

the single light from inside the
big white box illuminates
your hunched back, plays over
each and every vertebrae
that pokes out of
the skin

too thin
too much
always too much

so cold and alone in this kitchen,
fistful of raw hamburger meat to keep
that snarling beast under wraps

your lover slumbers in the next room
so afraid of waking them
when your skeleton twists into a new shape,
this new form replacing the fertile
blood that comes each month

raw meat warmed up by sweaty palms,
a sort of DIY choke-chain, holding
back the sharp teeth and terrible snarl

scrabbling claws to go with an
empty womb that will remain forever barren
you are okay with this,
preferring the purge of smaller
animals from a human stomach than
losing so much life-blood that
your body counters with anemia

your lover knows about this,
sometimes rubs your back through the worst
of it, runs gentle fingers through your
sweat and dirt clogged hair

it is okay, this new normal,
this exchange of one pain for another
an emptiness that will never be filled,
and twin scars of puckered pink

meat to mouth, lips pulling back
to allow for sharper, longer teeth

there is a steady drip of blood
running down your chin onto the floor,
this you will sop up later
with sponges and the promise of a warm
bed where the person that loves you
as a man and as a beast will
open their arms and
tell you to come back to bed

i yearn to make a house
inside of you
using stark-white ribs
for an a-frame

your lovely blood
waters the dandelions
and clovers nestled in
wooden window-boxes

i would like to
nestle myself inside
of your chest cavity, lover

pluck your heartstrings
like they were a harp
and i were something more
than a lovesick bard

loving a man
a wild thing in the shape
of a sea captain that
doesn’t know how to be
loved in that way

and i’ll watch your mouth
chapped lips pulled into
a grin, notice my blood
on your teeth

because, captain of mine
as much as i have been
fed on your affection and the promise
of an always returning
you have been fed on me, too

after all, the lone table
on this ship tossed about
by the mighty ocean waves
has always been set
for two

i have ugly hands
chewed cuticles, bitten
down nails and blunted fingertips

still, she says that i do not
tells me that my hands are beautiful
the hands of an
artist/writer/painter

the hands of a lover

but until these broken and
scarred hands of mine
have explored every dip
and contour of her body

how can i be sure?

we know
how you sleep
curved spine and
empty arms

your feet and legs
so cold with nobody
there to rub them
up against

you sleep like a person
that has been very lonely
for a very long time

watching you brings tears
to the eyes
for you are not a person
that is used to
nor that likes
to sleep alone

but there are miles between
both of your beds that
neither of you are quite sure
how to fill

because phone calls and texts
do not fill the empty nights

they do not block out
the chill of sleeping alone
when the one that you so
desperately want to curl
your hollow bones

that cracked and twisted skeleton
of yours around
is as lonely and cold
as you are

one night, floating on a sea
of *** and ale
the captain looks up at the bard
from where he’s laying with his head
in the bards’ lap, nimble fingers in his hair
says, “i love you”

words fail the poet now
and nothing escapes but
a sound between a sob
and a laugh

but the captain seems to understand
just the same
and for this the bard is thankful
presses a chaste kiss to the corner
of the captains’ mouth

and the next day
hungover and gripped by
panic over a loss not yet happened
the bard constructs a balcony
around the entire top half
of his two story cabin

watching from warm, salty waters
the siren laughs, insists it’s a widow's walk
and the bard doesn’t give her the satisfaction
of an answer, both knowing she’s right

there is a walk-way around the lighthouse
but it’s not enough
it’s just……
not enough

the siren watches this all
wishes briefly for legs
in order to go to the bard
hold him in her arms

the captain is not there
to see this
how the bard works with
tears in his eyes
a deep cut appearing
on the palm of his hand
and a slash through one eyebrow

the bard cries over the hammer
and nails, the wooden boards
and wrought iron

he cries for the captain
loving him too much
to try and cage a thing so wild
that only the ocean can soothe

he cries for the sadness
in the sirens’ eyes
bright red hair fanning out around
her in the deep green waves

and when the captain
sails back into view
the widow’s walk is complete

and the bard waits
leaning against the railing
he made with his own two hands
bandage on palm and face
and he cries again
but this time out of relief

on a cliff by the sea
there is a cottage
with a lighthouse rising up
behind the slightly slanted roof

though isolated, there is
no loneliness here
only the howling wind
and rolling grassy hills
dotted with daisies,
dandelions, and clovers

a bard resides there
that loved a sea captain
to the point of becoming
a beacon,
always more welcome than warning

and isn’t that a beautiful thing,
loving someone to the point
of creation?

after all, every living thing
needs some kind of constant

like a weather-beaten ship,
coffee always warm on the stove,

or a bard, tirelessly keeping
a light burning
in order to guide his
sea captain home

perhaps funnily enough
it is not the sea captain
that the bard has built a
home for his heart
inside of

of course
the captain holds so many
pieces of this heart already
tucked into pockets of
his tattered long-coat
and tangled in his hair

but the bard has so much
more to give
love manifested as a bouquet
of daisies held together by
a simple leather cord

****** shyly into the waiting
hands of a siren
bobbing up and down in the waves
hair red like the sunset
streaming out behind her

and this siren
her scent like something akin to home
all cinnamon and clove and sea water
cups the bards face in
her two hands

running gentle and webbed
fingers over week-old stubble
she murmurs,
“hello there, my sweet bard”

and the tug the bard feels
to dive into the swelling
waves of the ocean
has nothing to do with the
sirens beautiful, deadly song

nay, this tug has everything
to do with the love
and adoration in the sirens eyes

and how that makes
the bards tender and poetic
heart fill almost to bursting
with how much
he also loves her,
his lady of the ocean
and the waves