The sultry evening falls like the silk upon my shoulders
                   I kiss your throat as you write to your mother
It conflicts you, does it not?
                   The memory of her weeping and the very act of your hands
One clutching your pen, the other gliding over the inside of my thigh
                   Both ever so foolishly stained in the purest of black
It certainly conflicts me, my love, for all my tender heart longs for is this:
                   Stain me
Grip my hair, press me harder onto your lap, blacken me
                   Let me see the sweetest stars—
And may they be sweeter than the relish of raspberries upon my mouth
                   Write to your mother about me
I shall kiss you for it
                   And thus, as we clasp hands dreamily, become your muse

Hello short darling
I would plow you
like spring earth

but your husband
has only been
dead eight

eight months and I
fear the shiver of
my thighs

would be a cold
cold reminder
of him.

The air is warmer
at the river’s edge.

The insects cloud
around your head,

and the white cottage,
the one your wife’s
father built by hand,

seems to be burning
in the afternoon sun.

The hammock strung
between two dogwood
trees twists in the wind.

There should be no shame
in recollecting the songs
she sang when the children

were young and unpredictable,
how they splashed in shallow
water, catching minnows.

Why not close your eyes
and imagine you hear her
calling from the other side?

The slap of a fish jumping
is like a palm to your cheek.

Out there, in the middle of it all,
silver scales flash in clear water—

a contorted shadow swims below,
hooked to impossible brightness.

there is nothing to write about
total decay
whilst flesh youthful
(be it spring)
dead is the mind