There's a pyre in my chest, silver and gold
tracing the mountains of jewels and silks,
overlooking the cliffs of lost dreams and
broken memories like a woe lost in hymn.
It constantly burns, but like throwing a
flag onto the flames, it changes intensity --
colors green and purple and blue.
  Sporadic, bursts and sparks
    that threaten to engulf the soul
      that stands too close. I'm absent in thought
        when another memory splices the embers;
          effulgent, phosphorescent, lustrous, scintillating
            with a radiance unparalleled and unchallenged.
              The burns of your skin on mine clutching
                at my throat with such a wraithlike intensity --
                  I gasp.
                    The skirts of my soul catching, ablaze and unforgiving.
                    cowering at the echo of your lips teasing a mere inch
                    from mine. It does not run, does not leap for the
                    chilled waters below, just simply lets the fire burn
                    the smell of your clothes into the air around me --
                    whimpering all the while.