Love, what a Widow's day.
First bloom Celosia,
singing in the rain.
Rushing streams faint noises,
in a land some length away.
Dream clouds bathing,
in the clearest sky of blue.
  Children loafing on the chairs,
    complaining, "we have nothing to do."
There are dishes and laundry the plenty,
  but "no way" they always say.
    "Instead of working, or hiding in the house,
       we should go out and play."

Seraphine wields her dagger like a torch
to illuminate her path—a figure at once
youthful and monolithic. Mother Earth
caresses her as flowers bloom amidst
the bloodbath. the old skulls of dead
fascists rest in silver platters. three arrows
plunged into the hearts of charlatans,
an Iron Front, disrupting decorum.
the celosia petals burn like a bonfire
around Seraphine as her nāgī coils
like an ouroboros, slyly smirking.
Seraphine works the blade back and forth,
sawing through the ****'s neck, smiling
while decapitating the demagogue.

in my periphery
you arrived at my door
with your guns and cannons
i wondered why the uproar?
marched into my house with full force
and aimed your cannons at my door
to destroy my peace and drag me to the sea
the celosia in my garden still flourishing in the war
been through your drought, my undying love
i hate you to your face
but I love you behind your back
my friends called it a “a toxic affair meant to be crushed
either by fate or by your lover’s hand”

Prometheus stole fire from the gods
and gave it to us: clumsy humanity,
fumbling fools trapped in our own darkness.

for his crimes against Olympus, Zeus
had the titan bound to a rock, cursed
to suffer daily anguish.

•••

the celosia plant burnt bright orange
in the porcelain fist on my windowsill, fragile and stalwart
all at once: a brilliant symbol of our resistance.

now its leaves fade to a dull pallor, sick
from a lack of oxygen, wilting in absence
of the sun's warmth, starved for photosynthesis.

•••

i used to watch Bob Ross to fall asleep.
but now every stroke of his paintbrush
reminds me of your magenta aura—

an enigmatic glow that permeates your presence.
now i read The Sandman: Omnibus to stave off insomnia,
wondering when and where i first ****** up.