my nostrils spit fire
sandpapered passageway from boiling lungs
cracked and ragged,
bursting rivers to dust bowls
try to keep breathing, dragon woman.

so naive, how I believed collecting miles upon miles of rusted road signs and concrete structures
between
us
would wash your face from my mind
as if I had not already seared your eyes
into the sky of my daydreams
even now, you stare into me

I gnaw bloodstained lips,
scratch fevered fingertips on tweaking knees
and you,
you are rabidly foaming in my memory

how does an addict quit cold turkey
and not remit?
I ***** your name to strangers any chance I get
just to feel it
crawl out my mouth and tumble through my ears
back into the creases of my mind
pupils ****** open, I can hallucinate your breathing in my lungs
bartering oxygen for ghostly touch

werewolf mistress
haggard howling at a new moon
leave me to commune with absence,
to laugh in the face of doom