This nature of me,
the skin over my bones over my poetry,
I've missed this tender discourse,
the rhyme and reason of my slight frame held against glass.

I see myself better when I'm not trying to cry,
and I'd left this naked art so long
I could no longer tell the difference between
a night with stars and a night without.

This is buttermilk to starvation,
drowning twice and coming up for air.
The first mouthful aches like forestfire,
by the third I am a gulping animal.