The moon shone on the trees and found The trees were paler than the moon. The wind was a peroxide stain That stabbed, wormlike, toward the veiled fastness of my brain The wind that skinned me ‘til I stood, naked and raw; The corner of my mouth cradled a pestilential sore. My throat was lined and thin and wan As though it held the cranium of an antique and parasitic swan. I turned my mouth toward the origin of my demise And said, “ I vowed to die amongst the trees While human hands removed my clothes, and closed my crusted eyes And human voices stilled my vague unease But this will do for now.” A crow wheeled above as I keeled over in the dust and saw The sacred steepled chapel of somebody’s fleshless body Writhe beside me, and in hollow whispers fall; I closed my eyes and ushered in the shadows as the night began to crawl.