I've never liked my name,
so I tell you to call me Josie.

The O, an arc over the roses of my childhood
the garden in the front yard
where I fell asleep listening to Ravi Shankars' sitar.
Slipping, dead to the world, among the night blooming jasmine.

A beautiful thing.

Tonight,
future uncertain,
the stone weight of your head, adrift in dream on my hip,
feels a comfort to my blues.

A beautiful thing.

Napoleon for his Josephine,
can feel
the breath that you leave heavy on my thigh.

A beautiful thing.