foliage
i want to cover my skin with fallen leaves, their vibrancy and thinness, their bitter ink. i have never before been so heartbroken by the trees. how little i have noticed them, until at last i realize that i am not attentive enough for the brevity of their splendor nor intimate enough for the pale, leafless bodies they unclothe. let us, then, become acquainted. i am raw with pity, wind-bitten, tannin-stained. i will gather your tossed-off garments carefully, like a nextday lover, with that particular tactile joy.
*
how touch is the closest knowledge. the desire of fingertips seeking pulse in all things. i am brushing past houseplants, lightly grazing leaves, tracing beads of water with my thumb. surely they, too, know that it is november. (something in them must know that they have been set apart.) surely they, too, know how strangely and beautifully they are preserved. the most odd and precious is the autumn house-blossom: this captive flower, this pedestalled curiosity. a white-lily queen of golden forests. your curve and softness so much like his lips.
*
i am holding the stem of an oakleaf between my teeth, a wife made maidenly by the lack. my hands are empty as autumn. i am seduced by his body, graceful and plain as oak trees, and by november.
*
how touch is the closest knowledge. the desire of fingertips seeking pulse in all things. i am brushing past houseplants, lightly grazing leaves, tracing beads of water with my thumb. surely they, too, know that it is november. (something in them must know that they have been set apart.) surely they, too, know how strangely and beautifully they are preserved. the most odd and precious is the autumn house-blossom: this captive flower, this pedestalled curiosity. a white-lily queen of golden forests. your curve and softness so much like his lips.
*
i am holding the stem of an oakleaf between my teeth, a wife made maidenly by the lack. my hands are empty as autumn. i am seduced by his body, graceful and plain as oak trees, and by november.