blood of the covenant, thicker than the water of the womb. pale and paler birth want of healthy contrast and muscles decontracting and heartbeats slowly slowing and freckles invent a dance across her kiss across my lips. she ties a celtic knot around my throat, suffocating in a pretty way, a pretty bruise for the pretty pale place. if we use our naked limbs to trace our lineage back thousands of millions of years we find a common ancestor or two. i am not Adam or Eve and neither is she able to break her tree branch bones and fit herself into one of them, to mold herself into the shape of a perfect untainted human. so we forget our roots, we are flowers picked by circumstance and hardship and pale skin is not reflective. we let ourselves recollect in shaking breaths and ruffled hair and ruffled feathers and loose vetements and a whisper that tears the sheets and tapestries: i love you.