I had been her kind.
Neurotic and breathless like a dead girl.
The night no longer made me brave.

I tried to resurrect myself. I retraced my steps. I chanted forgotten rituals.
Anything to feel the warmth of Promethesus’ fire.
My voice was not my own.
Gravel embedded in wobbly knees,
I paid penance to a merciful god to bring her back to me.
Yet the sky remained silent.

I stood, screaming at the shore.
Yet His shrine still crumbled.

I climbed through ruins, and chased the sun.
Lungs burning for a glimpse of that old world.
I read Plath and bled out onto parchment.
Offering up every last valuable bit of myself.

Then on the third night,
the lantern glow spilled out from
a mouse hole carved into sandstone.
A sailor turned bricklayer
stood over the remains of my scaly skin.
He looked into my stormy eyes and
Begged for me.

Adoration without sacrifice.
How many had begged
to take away the fire that now licked at my chest?

The tide goes out,
And finally I can see the flotsam at my feet.
How sweet their gaze and sweeter yet,
the stutter of their pleas.