and my fingers will trace these scars on your chest — they're no fault lines but darling, i can fall and fall and fold myself into wildflowers on which sunlight unfurls. but this world, it's a battlefield and red roses bloom not from the soil but from the skin and every death feels like the first.

every kiss feels like the last.

and darling, tomorrow, we have all the time to be broken. we have all the time to grow up. but tonight, let me hold you close; my hands are weary of writing elegies. tonight, let me drown in your seastorm eyes; i am tired of looking for temporary ports and for all the wrong shades of blue. tonight, i will read you poems about a girl named helen, who loved despite the war. tonight, the world can crumble down and i can stay right here, safe and sound in the comfort of your sighs, like a girl resting against bruised lilacs. i can stay right here watching you sleep until the earliest hours, forever asking myself how can someone so ******, so broken by this world possess this much softness.

this much gentleness.

this much peace.

regardless, rest your weary bones, my love. morning still is far away.