The pianist, realizing he will never have me,
plays the last few notes of Chanson Triste.
Go, he says,
*and take that with you.

Out of work muse
seeks out of words poet.

Must love grammar,
discord, whole days lost
to plotting coups through bitten lips

and safe words drawn with fingertips;

should know to not break my heart
at night, when there are still
hours of emptiness to fill up with sorrow.

Available evenings, starting tomorrow.

days brisk with drumbeats,
evenings spilled from riverbanks—
drifts of violet, ripe moons.

I used to be your
grinning goddess,
tangled, finished,

and you, my proud tiger.

Now it's cool kisses
and a tidy bed.
We're nothing like we were
back then.

Last night I wanted you to stay,
so I gave a bit of me away.

This morning, only one regret;
would I always be a brandished breast?
a glimpse of stockinged thigh, outstretched?

Or could I cool it down a few degrees?
Long enough for you to see

that of all the ways I know to please,
my body is but one of these.

I couldn't sing the hymns,
but I could recreate you
in the corners of my eyes
so that you could walk through the door
in a storm of miracles
and we could all gather on the lawn
in our summer sweaters and our sweet perfume
to laugh about how scared we were.

Still night;
eyes keen,
sheets unfurled—
sails.

The night, sometimes,
swims with sad fish.

The night, sometimes,
is a ritual drowning.

Lonely, I consider waking you
to say

*Look—
the stars are bioluminescent, baby.