My words dry me
up. They are
matchsticks I light,
more than once I touched them with the wet
tip of my tongue to smother the
flame, only to swallow
them, still burning.
Accidental fire eater. And for the duration of the flame, I am
a firefly.
(The last time I saw one I was with you, at Princeton.
Glowing in the dark humid air, their electrical
firefly bodies. Pre-storm.
...
I swallow them
up. It's no accident.
Unspoken, my burning words are
an incomplete circle.
A resolution that may exist
but remains undiscovered, like
that one time you lost your forgiveness for
me through a hole in your
coat's pocket.
In the Alphabet City,
a woman is burning alive.
With my glowing bones cracking burns every
last page,
every stop sign,
every ending so you'll never
have a trace of peace.
