The trees of my childhood
are not the trees of your
childhood.

Let me tell you about my
cedars; my forsythias
and honeysuckles;
the way I used to plant
cherry pits in the front lawn
because I was greedy for their
blossoming.

Lift up my skirt and I’ll show you
where the blackberry brushes had
scratched me.

Lay me down in a hammock
hung between your childhood and the
man you have become today.

And we’ll kiss once, twice,
and a third time for luck

beneath the cherry blossom petals
that I had fallen asleep beneath
when I was too young to know anything
but innocence.

And the dark bark will be a darker midnight
against the spring it blossoms.

Skeletal. Moonless.
So heavy from the
rain.

And your hand will fold a flower
behind my ear.

And the petals will be
so extraordinarily
pale.

i volunteered for it! x

it was the first of
mornings and
the sun did not know
what to do;
unsure of how to feel.

it resembled much of
the confliction felt
by the humans who came
after.

plummet v.

she stood from where
our necks craned to watch
and imagined

1. she gained
an incredible weight,
a heaviness
to pull her to the ground

2. mother watching from below

3. misunderstood birds
falling altogether,
bones breaking with a thud

4. the earth cracked open,
looking like a mouth agape
or
an open chest
minus the sticky heart

tonight,
the stars are lit like matchsticks.
you see dogs trooped
in threes and you wonder
what these nightly meetings hold.

it doesn’t matter now though.

tonight,
the city is in a war,
a competition of light against
light.
you’ve found how to keep yourself
warmly in smoke and froth;
snuggling rather closely
to things little girls don’t keep by.

you wait for 3 am
before leaving for home
and so i decided i’d wait with you, separately.

darling,

we’re no longer young
but don’t you feel the same?

i feel like a cloud
fickle in shape,
triangles suddenly
morphing into bunnies;
little houses
to lopsided kites.

i watch them pass
quietly
and then as though
by a stroke of genius,
i realize that this is
the pattern
of my own musings:

very ignorant to pauses,
passionately hopping from
first to next.

on and on this goes,
never quite weary.
so do the clouds continue
to sail themselves,
only nearly grazing
the blue sheets.

“there are little tremors
about your chest
or rather dinosaur footsteps,
enormous soundwaves
crashing through the atrium”

“how can i strike up
such a ruckus (?)”