Her skin is held together
by a thread, rips and tears
make it hard for her to breathe
Vision going yellow in the
half-light, twilit fields rippling
in the breeze
Holding seeds between
her teeth, her bones balanced
over the concrete
She knows it will not last
forever - she has seen the yard
where she'll be buried
She's a victim still intact,
waiting for just the wrong eyes
to reach her hair, her skirt
Fear presses through veins
and she watches the sky,
remembering that angels
will wait, in the clouds,
until you need them - her
grandmother said, they
will wait, and she believed
it. Her cactus tongue ******
catches blood there, and
the tide washes through,
its rhythm a comfort
She finds her way home.