Seven.

Bare your teeth,
your needle tongue

pierce my skin and lips
and steal life from me.

There!
My final exhale,
a soft whisper,
your name


because it has always been you,
even when I wasn't sure,
pretended I didn't know.

The last thing I know is death,
a cold breeze that sweeps
my broken bones away,

and then I sense my awakening,
feel my body regaining shape,
straining to reassemble.

Before my eyes I see them, 

our coming days, a collage 

of blood and running wild, 

feeding and winter picnics, 

graveyard family reunions.

I never believed in afterlife

until I saw it for myself.

Six.

Sometimes I catch myself
wandering in those depths of my mind
I thought
I had long ago excommunicated.

Those depths you touched,
that only you have touched.

I amble through those dark rooms
no bulbs of light, no burning wax,
just the inconsistent flicker of fireflies
against the walls,
small, fuzzy bursts of
faded, disjointed memory,
to remind me of what we were.
Or what I thought we were.

I wonder sometimes
(all the time)
why you choose him
(instead of me).
Why you disappeared
inside his abuse,
held it against my mouth
to suffocate us both.
Why you coveted his hatred
and banished my love.

I decorate our forgotten halls
with my questions
because they have
nowhere to go
except
somewhere inside of me,
and this is the only somewhere
I can sometimes
forget.

Five.

          A slow, quiet thunder
drum, drum, drum
          deep behind my skull
pulse, pulse, pulse
           a threat to my mind
thump, thump, thump
           louder and louder
clang, clang, clang
           until it's a full percussion line
boom, boom, boom
           and I'm drowning in rhythm
cacophony, discord, bedlam 


I am just a heartbeat, a gasp,
just the pain that these migraines bring.

Four.

I thought I could                                                       stand
tall against your chest,
unwavering in that loving gaze
that played with my heart
so viciously, so tenderly

until you asked me to                                               sit
next to you on the top
of the blue wire mesh
of a picnic table
beside that quiet lake

and you did your best to                                          catch
me as I tumbled from my
safety place into your
safety net, your safety arms,
a sacred place against your neck

because it hurt so much to                                    release
all those shattered pieces
from that bag of bones
that was my fragile body,
the shell you grew to love.

Three.

Does the rain beg the sun's forgiveness
for diminishing its light?
Do the clouds?
Do the trees with their stretching limbs
or mountains with their swelling peaks?

Or does the sun win every war
eventually,
no matter who survives each
battle,
and so every force
makes every attempt
it can possibly muster
to take a bite
out of that blazing yellow ball?

But why would they all
go to such lengths
just to fail
at every bend?

Perhaps because
a single wound
is worth more
that quiet compliance,
a single morsel
is worth more
than an empty stomach.

Two.

Sometimes dreamers
wait
wait
wait
until dreams become words
and dreamers become writers

but suddenly no one is sleeping
and the dreams stop forming,
the words stop flowing --

there are no more dreams,
no more words.

After enough time has passed
and lakes have dried
into cement beds,
another quiet night
stirs dreamland's gate
lifting the heavy latch
from its metal prison,
opening wide
for
all
and many hopeless dreams emerge
that spawn new, hopeless words

and the cycle dawns
as the moon rises,
full and bright and yearning
for worlds to unfold
beneath her gaze.