In May she came, in May she stayed, in May she was gone

cupping palmfuls of petals
you and I
we picked leaves of basil

gray-eyed
with owls you burst forth
bark flaking off tall trees revealing
underneath a cream color

it was the same
with your heart
under my nails
hand over the port side

dipping our fingers into an ocean of flowers

broke them over bread
and tomatoes from the roof
cut so thin like us
they trembled in the wind

I want all of your skin in my mouth at the same time

a summer with nothing to do but sit on thrones

white
as a mountain peak
the inside part of your thigh

my teeth upon it

every church bell leaning in
the direction of our wild un-wildness
the place where the sun does not reach

that the earth might use us
to feel something warm upon it

—an ocean boiling
the brass casing spent and hot
after the shell has been shot from the rifle

the launching of music into the breaking of vases

limes and avocados carried over our state lines
pushing the wagon filled with your body of birds
Mexico was a time without goddesses

our heat unbuttoning our top buttons
my body laid across the balcony to catch rain

drinking the water off of one another

wishing to sip your lip
I wished only one wife in my lifetime
wished for only my tongue on your neck

only your legs to push my mouth between
wanted husband to remain

a beautiful word for you
wanted to be husband as your mother is mother

as your sister is sister your father
is father
still

the garden of your love was a strangeness
and still I loved to lay
amongst its strange things

the cruelty you at times stretched upon me
simply because there were arrows within reach
pulling the shaft through the other side

for so long I did not know the wound
could only feel the feathers
brushing their way out of it

even after it is all done
I am learning what marriage might mean
what the ever-changing relic of self means

—bird of my heart
that is not a bird

separate of the seasons I pass through
my body remains a springtime

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