There once was a little sparrow who fell in love with a lion.
The lion warned the sparrow not to love him,
for he was bigger than she,
and he could crush her fragile bones.

But, the sparrow said, "No, Lion. I cannot go. I will love you even as I lay broken beneath your paw."
And so it was.
He loved her like he shouldn't, said they.
She didn't know how to love, said them.

Their squawks and twitters fell upon deaf ears.
The lion and the sparrow ran from them.
The sparrow flew away to nestle in the lions mane,
The lion roared at the slanderers, unknowing animals.

They ignored them.
They walked through woods in the rain,
Escaped in the night
And ran through the plains.

The lion stepped softly,
Kept the sparrow safe.
The sparrow sang sweetly,
Kept him in her wake.

"I love you," said the lion,
"like I never thought I could."
"I love you," said the sparrow,
"like I never knew I would."

"Don't ever go," said the lion,
"I cannot imagine you gone."
"Don't ever leave," said the sparrow,
"I know now, you are my song."

The murmurs faded,
Beasts quieted with time,
But the lion and the sparrow vowed to love the other,
Until the stars fell down.

i am my mothers child.
my mothers hands that held me, that i never wanted,
are my own.

"we have been cursed with beauty," she said.
i always remembered that.
and how fragile,
how bony her hands were.

her resolve to use them,
how it amazed me.
working in the garden tirelessly,
i knew how they ached.

our eyes are the same,
jade.
the big slanted kind,
like a cat, someone told me once.

my lips are bigger than hers,
my ******* too. I remember her being so bothered,
"that's not supposed to happen,
you must have got your ***** from your dad!"

my dad.
i was always a daddy's girl,
a tomboy,
especially when i was young.

i retained some traits from my father.
he is a good man.
but the things i learned best from him,
i wish i had not.

i learned to lie,
how to spend money where it was not needed,
and perhaps, how to be lonely.
i am my mother's child.

the night sweeps in with its great, black wings.
rustling, silk feathers.
i'm caught in the envelope, suffocated in midnight down.
i lay next to a man who is not mine and i am not his.
handsome. nice. respectable.
everything that good for me, being chaos, and he is warm.
i can feel his heart beside me. pulse. pulse. pulse.
heartbeat that is not my own. some kind of security 've missed.
but i don't feel secure.
the rhythm is not the one i love.
i lay next to a man who is not mine and i am not his.
we could label ourselves pretenders, but wed know anyways.
eyes flutter, a shiver runs through me.
braille. braille. braille flesh.
i am the pretender, creating my world as i go along.
this world is bleak in the winter. forced by the earth to be patient.
he isn't you. doesn't think. doesn't look. doesn't feel like you.
i turn over, away, stare out the window.
imagine you somewhere else, imagine you with me.
you sit in your chair, watching me. candlelight flickers.
dances over our faces, spills over the walls and settles between us.
megan. megan. are you asleep?
what? oh. he was talking to me.
back to reality.
i lay next to a man who isn't mine, and i am not his to love.

I live in limbo.
Suspended somewhere between towering
Steel Titans and
an ocean of corn.
It's that time of the year again.
I know where I need to go.

I sit in traffic, start and stop.
This line stretches to the main road.
I'll be here awhile.
I close my eyes and I'm there already
My quarter mile square of peace
that shouldn't be peaceful.

A car horn blares behind me,
urging me to scoot up fifty feet
just to stop again for another five minutes.
I just want to get there and away
from this fight,
away from these angry people.

I know they're just anxious
to get home after their
daily nine to five
in the city.
They keep inching West, like me.
But I'm not going home.

Finally at the light.
I turn up the radio.
It's clear the stiff in the three piece suit
in the next lane
is not
a fan of Van Halen.

I return his surly glare
with one of my own.
Past the light and
I keep rolling on.
Past the restaurants and
tanning salons.

I stop at the grocery store
and pick up some orchids for her.
I pick the purple ones
because I think maybe,
she might have liked purple.
But I have no idea, not really.

Breaching suburbia,
where I pass housing developments
that someone had the audacity to brand
with snooty names reminiscent
of high end golf clubs.
Who do they think they are?

As I go, the houses get bigger,
further apart.
The windows down,
I take a cleansing breath.
The air, a little cleaner
than before.

Coasting into rural territory,
I glance at the equestrian farm
and abandoned barns,
ripe with decay,
that might crumble
at the slightest touch.

On and on,
just trying to get
to that place,
where few go but me.
That peaceful place
that really shouldn't be peaceful.

I pull up to that familiar octagonal STOP.
Look right to the llama farm,
Left to the empty bean field,
Straight ahead at the sign: Plain City - Georgesville Rd.
I think maybe they call it Plain because
It all looks quite the same.

Over hills that send my stomach into my lungs,
Past the Canaan Community mobile homes
Which is apparently "A nice place to live."
I know its up here on the left,
That old gravel drive that
no one else sees when they pass.

One more hill and I'm here.
Pulling in under the archway that reads
FOSTER CHAPEL CEMETERY.
I turn down the music,
slow the car,
turn off the engine and listen.

Birds, slight breeze,
the occasional passing car
that sounds like a jet plane out here.
Sinking sun sets this place ablaze.
Wish granting dandelions and silk flower petals
strewn by the whispering wind.

Cars pass by, they don't look this way.
I imagine if they did,
they would marvel that a red Grand Am,
and a living person were there where
hardly anyone ever goes.
This is a place for the dead.

I sit on a cracked stone bench
and watch a monarch
flutter and rest on someone's resting place.
I come here when I can't breathe at home.
And sometimes I'm awed by how
beautiful it is here.

How peaceful it is in this moment.
Then I remember why I came today.
A hundred yards of hundred year old
headstones that have since been
weathered illegible.
A few, I can still make out.

Six feet under,
the bones of people I never knew.
Sometimes I wonder about their stories,
the things they might've done
when they lived.
Bow my head for the ones who died young.

On my way to the back,
I look over one I've read a dozen times.
"Jonathan Alder
First white settler in Madison Co.
Taken by the Indians in 1781,
Returned to his mother in 1805."

So much history here.
People who were buried here
after death.
And of course there's her.
The girl who died here
at the hands of a very bad person.

Incongruously dead among
the dead who belonged here,
she was gone before my birth.
I never knew her,
never knew she was here before
I found this place by accident one summer.

Took the second time I came to notice
the wooden cross wired to the fence in the back.
"KILLED HERE MARCH 17, 1991"
It makes me sick to see it.
But still, I lay down the bit of life
I plucked from a bucket in the store.

I always come a month after
the anniversary of her death.
I imagine it might be sufficiently awkward to run into
her family, who may wonder
why a girl who never knew her
would lay flowers in her memory.

There was some rumor years ago
that she haunted this place.
I don't know about that.
But if her spirit still roamed here,
tormented soul, I'd like to think
that she is glad for the company when I come.

For I come more often not in April,
but when I'm angry
or can't clear my head.
I find peace in the beauty here,
and wonder in the extensive history,
and a reminder.

She reminds me that
she never had the chance at life that I do.
She reminds me to appreciate
the life I was given.
Reminds me it could be taken
from me any day.

Some think it strange to find peace
in a place of death and tragedy.
And I must agree.
But this is also a place of rest.
A quiet place for the dead to sleep,
or maybe wait for company.

I don't always do right.
Don't always say the right thing.
I can be volatile and childish sometimes.
And I come here when I know I need to be humbled.
And I wonder to myself,
Isn't this a strange place for peace?

In the shade of the freeway
The pretenders stalks his prey
Innocence quite uncorrupted
Until today.

In the shade of the willow tree
You lay here next to me
Draped in Spanish moss
Cicada symphony.

In the shade of the old motel
Feels like she's got to sell
Cigarette lights up the night
Sees a face she knows too well.

there was a cemetery day
in the heat of july
when the shadow dreams called
and i fell in love with you.

there was a cemetery day
when i walked tight ropes
when we serenaded the birds instead
and made grass angels.

there was a cemetery day
when we threw stones in the quarry
thought seriously about diving in
and promised to one day.

there was a cemetery day
when the cicadas sang high
where silk flowers caressed the graves
and we danced like children often do.

there was a cemetery day
when we stood between our cars
anticipation under the haze of the streetlight
and you almost kissed me.

there was a cemetery day
when my head was reeling
realization breaching my skies
and i didn't want to go.

there was a cemetery day
when we drove until we couldn't
sunlight scattered in our quiet
and you thought about our fingers interlaced.

there was a cemetery day
when we lay out on the dock
the one that floats just off shore
and you caught me as i fell.

there was a cemetery day
in the heat of july
when the shadow dreams called
and you fell in love with me too...

8am.
the sun is still waking up.
groggy and rubbing the night out of her wide eyes.
stretching her wings to wrap around the great earth.
or atleast america...
i switch on the espresso machine.
she hums loudly as if to say,
"just five more minutes, mom!"
i know, i feel the same,
my dear espresso machine.
oh goodness.
shiny mercedes whipping around the bend.
into MY parking lot? i wait to see...
yes. my parking lot. my shop.
haughty lady all in a rush,
can't stop and enjoy the morning for one second,
the pretty morning.
"um, yeah. i need a blah blah blah blah blah. and make it snappy. i have somewhere to be."
are you sure you dont want me to add a splash of manners in there for you?
no? okay. have a nice day.
it's too early to deal with this ****.
the sun's still waking up.
i haven't had my coffee yet.

'Tis heartbreaking to see you marvel so at children's play.
Do you not remember that you were once a child?
Have you lost the sweet ring-a-ding-dings of fairytale teachings?
Each day you fall further into The Man
And away from Peter Pan, Sara Crewe, Alice, and The Great Baron Munchausen himself.
I have not forgotten the road to where they go.
Begin where you are,
Sitting mundane, in your realm of logic and laws, tasteless office cubicle.
Now close your eyes and count to ten!
One Mississippi, two Mississippi...
When your eyes creak open you'll have to think fast!
You've no weapon against that smelly pirate with his dagger to your throat!
Give a good kick and a hard shove and you'll see the blade has changed hands, AVAST!
One good ****** and you slice through his thieving guts like butter!
Abandon ship! And SPLASH! into a garden surrounded by stone.
All you've to do is turn your head to see the peonies, the morning glories, the honeysuckle dripping in dew.
Now straighten up and grab hold of your bearings; that's it!
What was that?!
It blew by you, fast as lightning and just as bright.
A fairy! It must have been!
You run off after it but your foot catches a mangled root and you
SLAM! Face first into...WHAT IS THAT?!
Bones?! Now scramble to your feet and dash to the opening of the damp cave,
Round the corner and AH! crash into a giant gray ogre! GRRAAAGGHGHH!
Quick! Pick up that femur at your feet and pitch it into his eye! Ha! You big brute!
Duck between his great tree trunk legs and RRRRRIIIINNNNGGGG!
There goes the office phone.
But you're still out of breath and desperate for more.
Silly, don't you know? It's not something I can teach you.
You just have to REMEMBER.

I heel, ball, toe on a beaten path
in the cold and the dark.

The light of the cartoon moon spills

over my skin,

suddenly braille.

Alone and shivering I begin to move.
No longer on the path in Ohio,
but in the firelight in Bogota'.
Golden flesh.
Twisting and body pulsing
with the beat of the music.


Back home where it’s cold and dark.
Dizzy and sick with heat that

isn’t there with me at all.

You can’t be here with me either.

When I sleep,

I’ll make like Eloisa, unbounded.

I suppose for now,
The cartoon moon will have to be company enough.

we are awake,
you and i.
we are awake, together.

we sit in silence,
by the light of a turtle,
mulling over what is to come.

i believe i have carried life inside me,
i could not sustain it,
and it faded away quietly.

what would i have done,
had it lived in me?
am i heartbroken or safe?

you wrap me in you,
like an old quilt,
the  safest place i can be.

i will not have as they will,
but they will not have as i do.
i will not search for love.

i will never know desperation for company,
struggle for love or companionship.
i     have     you.

take me under.
sweet surrender.
let me sink into you like my feet in the sand
as the tide pulls it away.

lay with me in silence
on the beaten path
in the cold and the dark.
the light of the cartoon moon
shining through queen anne's lace trees.

the clouds take shape before us, pulsing.
a butterfly.
a castle.
where before, turtles trudged on the side
of the road,
plastic bags.

that ringing sound, inside my head
the bells and the synthesizer pulling,
strumming, stringing my brain cords.
i rest my head on his shoulder, only just.

he used to be inside.
he made me this today,
and he knew id never been happier
than in my "wonderland."
i was my very own alice,
spinning, dizzy with delight.
lost in a fantasy.

"i am not sorry for my soul."
he's distant, but so close.
and i don't even care that he doesn't love me.

he's calm and observant, reading me
while i dance in front of him
no longer on the path in Ohio,
but in the firelight in Bogota'
golden flesh.
twisting and body pulsing
with the beat of the music.

the guitar makes me languid
and you run your hands over my skin,
and we fall into each other,
fall into the heat.

back home. cold and dark.
a boy, not in the same place as i.
he will not cease to be an object
of my fascination.
abstract understanding of him.

we were meant to change each other,
never to love the other.

but YOU. you and i,
we were meant to spin, crazy, out of control.
so right, so wrong.
i fall into you over and over and over and once more.
and i never want to leave you,
though the cartoon moon says i just might have to.

take me under.
sweet surrender.

The Pisces people take their fins for granted
And the boys all shout that they want their money.
Oh the books are thick but they are all slanted
And the girls all cry 'cause its inherent to the nature of their minds.

I scream and you scream and we all scream for peace
And the men all plead that it isn't their fault.
We all keep eating and complain we're obese
And the dogs all bark 'cause its inherent to the nature of their minds.

Oh the ****** all think the bed is too creaky
But they shut their mouths because the money is good.
The business man laughs, he thinks he is sneaky
And the old ones die 'cause its inherent to the nature of their minds.

Politicians smile because it is their job
And the soldiers die 'cause the old men start wars.
The police all try to shake the angry mob
And these words now end 'cause its inherent to the nature of my mind.

she takes another order
takes another tip
takes another glance at him
at those chestnut eyes.
he looks at her
looks across the room
looks back again
catches her staring.
she blushed gold
blushes that he saw her looking
blushes again he caught her blushing
tucks an ebony lock behind her ear.
so he asks her to dance in the tokyo rain
their hearts are raging fires converging.
"aishiteru," she whispers in his ear
as he boards again.
"take me with you."
so he came back for her
against her mothers orders.
but it was not about defiance
and it was not about skin.
two hemispheres
two perspectives
one sweet love.

our kings
our queens
our shoulder angels
they all LIED to us,
THEY SAID IT WOULD BE JUST FINE.
oh, breathe.
take in words that mean nothing.
heavily broken and all i want to do is
CLOSE MY EYES.
my bones are shattered
my very FRAME crushed under the weight these faces put upon me.
i am caught in a butterfly net
struggling for air.
imagine me sighing.
because that is what i am now.
EXASPERATED.
i do not know how to be angry.
so it would seem, i slip to and fro
very much suffocated by Bitter and Sad.
they mock me, i fear.
Bitter flares up in me, tickling my throat
mean and sarcastic to say the least.
She laughs, "WHY CAN"T YOU GET ANGRY?!
THAT IS WHAT YOU ARE, IS IT NOT?"
I feel a small heat in my gut.
retaliate.
but then Sad slinks around my waist, slippery and cold.
come back.come back.come back.
no, no witty comeback.
just coming back to the UNBRAVE CAVE.
i think i resent sad for her ability to pull me away with her clammy eyes.
but i come.
these promises fall like rain and i remember when you said
ITS JUST A WORD.
i'm talking in my sleep.
dreaming of things that should taste sweet
but are bitter in truth. another mockery, i'm sure.
WORDS LIE beneath sheets of paper.
i tilt my head back, look to the sky where
GOLDEN LEAVES
SILVER FEATHERS
fall like snow, gracing the trees.
feel me sigh again, heavy.
my fingertips are cold, sick. tracing lines over my skin.
searching for a pocket where closure could lie hidden.
i'm running in circles, forgetting every day a little more.
fading. stuck in this disconnect, in limbo,
BURIED ALIVE.
rollercoaster dreams.
it would seem there is no closure for those who do not know how to be angry.

i am a poem.
my stanzas are in my skin. my rhythm in my heart.
beat in my fingertips.
pulsating.
my scars are my story. the ones you can see and the ones you cannot.
i am many mistakes, lines words phrases X out.
change this to sound prettier, change that to make sense.
i am my history as ink to paper, traveling incessantly, twists and turns and loops.
i am cursive and i am print.
i am story and i am song.
these inkblots are in my veins wicked and tangled.
i am free to be what i choose, whether it is what you like or not.
i am insatiable, for my words are endless.
i am lies and i am truths, manipulation of words to caress the readers ear.
i am adjectives and nouns.
i speak verbs to make me move.
i am hesitant when i wish then i am done.
i am goodnight sun, goodmorning moon. i am swordfights and fairytales galore.
i am sensible by little means, but you listen just the same.
i am a beginning, i am a middle, and i am an end. but not this end...

you are that of the sun, which yearns for cold. i am that of the ice which yearns for warmth.
you are warmth.
like sunlight seeps into my skin
as hot summer wine spills over my lips.
you are pure gold.
glinting off of petals
running down the leaves like drops of dew
on a morning after summer rain.
you are the sun, the summer king,
who tucks my hair behind my ear,
and suddenly a dandelion rests there.

i am cold.
like crystal snow creeps over your skin
as water falls from where it does not wish to be.
i am blue-white.
pale skin so soft, taking in the cold
as ice claws its way over the earth,
over you.

and we touch, and it burns, seasons clashing, searing pain sharp like needles.
and in your eyes that speak of golden wine,
fire and dancing and such,
i am the queen of snow.
cold to the touch, with eyes that pierce like a winter storm.
you calm my storm.
you, who settles icy winds,
my thrashing and screaming.
you, who soothes my pain,
who calms me.
though your skin burns white hot, searing my frost bitten fingertips,
i long for it.

She holds her knees to her chest,
hair falls in strings over her eyes.
Strung out in an alley that is
still cobblestone here.
She does watercolors on her cheeks in black.


Underground entrance cover stained with graffiti,
padlocked after school hours
to prevent sinners and hoodlums from
smoking down there,
and what have you.


Across the street, dance studio.
A mother escorts her offspring inside, carrying satin.
You cannot walk in them outdoors.
Piano on the roof that has not been played
in a decade, I'm sure.


My legs dangle through iron bars,
stairs on either side.
Hiding behind a garden made for children
by my mother,
I watch the sun set High on fire.

What a wretched thing,
Hollow mahogany and
Mother of pearl inlay
That houses your love for me.

We're in our twenties now,
But I remember seventeen,
October rising around our ankles
Like a flood.

I never minded being your muse,
But I didn't want your love.
That heavy, languid thing,
Too big a burden for my fragile frame.

We used to sit on playground swings.
You would strum that hollow thing
And I would sing about the day and
The night and the in between.

Then it was my turn for silence.
And I wished you wouldn't sweat,
Wished you wouldn't close your eyes
And contort your countenance with passion.

Such sweet words rolled off your tongue,
I felt guilty for hating every one.
Your talent was undeniable.
If only the words weren't about me, for me.

And those steel strings,
Those chords that broke the still night air
Made people wonder how I couldn't love you.
How could I deny such feeling?

But they weren't there the night you kissed me.
I stood solid, didn't even breathe,
As you pulled my hair and pressed your lips to mine,
Such desperation that only made me fear you.

They didn't feel the anger inside you
When you pulled away from me
And I couldn't meet your eye,
Turned to lick away the salt and iron on my lips.

For a moment I thought you might hit me,
But the wall took the blow instead.
"God ******, Megan."
Then you were gone.

Why did you have to ruin those easy nights?
Balancing on street curbs,
Sharing a fifth of gin,
Playing under orange streetlights.

I would tap the tambourine.
We'd nod our heads and let the melody
replace the marrow
in our bones.

That's all I wanted.
Just the music,
Just some easy company.
Never asked for that sickly love.

The day I made you hate me,
That old thing turned up outside my door.
I put it in the corner
Where it gathers dust each day I don't hear from you.

No one else hears the music like you did.
But you had to go and love me.
Now you're gone and all of seventeen sits silent in the corner.
What a wretched thing.

He's just a people boy and I'm just a people girl

And he's breaking my floor

I come tumbling down

Scraping my elbows and knees along the way


Music fills my head with his breath behind it

Rhythm pounding inside my skin

Traveling through my veins

Paced for a race and wild like flames


His lips are soft but I wouldn't know

Voice that crawls into my ears

And makes my bones sing right out loud

Eyes that make me shiver when they find mine


Smooth and sweet he hides on the other side

Rain falls steady blinding

Bitter and rough I try to get there

Impossible he stands tall so I can see


Sleep calls out to me

Deep and deeper I breathe through a straw

He floats on past me head above water

Slippery indifferent are my hands that reach


Silence fills up our space

Speech boiling stuffy beneath our tongues

The world watches unknowing as I struggle

No telling whether he can hear


Falling farther than ever

Were almost out of reach

Tossing in sleep that pulls at our dreams

Idle idealistic from a distance


I am the outsider

My footsteps are everywhere lost

He's walking ahead looking back

Aching to speak


Between lines of love lines of fear

We stand together apart

Looking up at a sea of faces that would see

So our footsteps make not a sound



Tangled are we

Confused in our places

What we know is right

And yet what we see is redundant unmoving


So we stand at a still breathe each others maybes

They look right through us

Never substantial but always tangible transparent are we

In any other place time world


He's just a people boy and I'm just a people girl

And he's broken my floor

I come stumbling tragic

Breaking my heart along the way.

asleep at the light,

veteran dreams of the fight.

lost in the front lines,

the screams of fellow comrades

are really angry car horns.

starlight. starbright.
don't you forget to breathe tonight.
ivy climbs all up your arms in through your secrets out your metaphors.
you whisper unspeakables to me
as i lay restless
tossing
and
turning
tingling
and
tormented.
blossoms fierce. lilies scattered.
your skin is dark.
tinted green.
                    your green angel skin.
                                                    your soil black eyes.
deeper than memories
those charred remains of us...
the ashes that fell when the wind blew
your
thorn
jacket warding off affection.
the smoke dancing outsiders
"don't you get too close. don't you take me in."
you are the shadow that haunts me in my dreams.
                your green angel skin
                                                 brushing against mine
your dark silk voice
slipping across my mind.
i cannot seem to get away
from you.
you turn and look me in the the eye
the way you do.
you know exactly what you're doing to me.
the verdict of your vision
rolls in with the smoke storm
the products of your privilege.
these thoughts are wearing
on your thorn jacket.
your conviction is fading.
                     i lose myself
                                       in our convergence.
because you are my lily in the ash.
starlight. starbright.
please don't you leave me tonight.

your nevers are thick, grainy like salt.
i taste your bitter words.
look, young prince, you are not alone.
be you broken, cracked or shattered...

my frame lies beside yours, equally broken.
you're searching for something in the wrong places, dear.
i pray you close your eyes and see,
your stars are all you need...

whether through whispers or wonders
or shadows of love and lust,
you are not truly broken.
look at your palm, love.

those lines, those rivers traveling endlessly
are your guide to peace.
wrap your mind in satin sheets,
in glittering diamonds, pearls and lace.

in your mind seeps a poison so thick,
i choke on it as i speak.
you are not alone chasing stardust, my dear.

i am always here,
parallel to you.
though at a distance,
chasing the same.

and we race, out of breath
and reaching for what is no longer there.
and we fall, we cry,
and think of failure.

but in our dreams we find the strength to believe in something more,
arrows in the mud that point us in the right direction,
or sunlit clearings.
sparkling dew, soul garden.

Night sweeps in with its great, black wings.
These rustling, silk feathers that
impregnate my lungs with midnight down.
I lay next to a man who is not mine and I am not his.
We label ourselves Pretenders as he pushes himself into my florid space.
My eyes flutter, a shiver runs through me.

He and I are charlatans, fabricating our worlds as we go along,
composing these ravenous ghosts line after sloppy line
like its our civic duty to make people see things that aren't there;
as if our entire identity resides in our ability to be a competent weaver of words.
My God, is this all we have in common?

This world is bleak in the winter, forced by the earth to be patient.
And yet, this air that rams glass splinters down our throats cannot muster
a flake or tempest to free my mind from this unfamiliar bed I'm in.
I lay next to a man who isn't mine, and I am not his to love.

her eyelids close. hot heavy and sticky in the creases with the slime the heat of the day.
she is bruised on her legs. green purple yellow. clumsy her. someone ought to tell her to be careful.
but she looks again and they look sort of like mishapen art on her flesh. bruises and dark freckles, scattered, over her shoulders like flecks of paint. dark hair, crazy hair, she tries to fix to no avail. her heartbeat thunders in her thin bones, louder than her voice rambling sweet nothings and her fingers tapping the nightstand. the ink in her skin slink off of her body like vines, roots, slithering across the bed over cotton hills to reah him. soak into him and wrap their tendrils around the ink in his skin.