Countless centuries I’ve traced this careworn map, yet I’m still
surprised by your thirst for me. My breath holds — bated
and lonesome. Arid desert laps at humid hills while wall clouds
form against the dust. Urgent and whole, like muscle
pressed to muscle, I wait for the shadow of hush to make its way
into my empty belly. Guts rising with the moon, sand stuck
to fallen membrane. Broken teeth gnash against broken
teeth emptied by celestial bodies. Small slivers of stars
seed into eternity as I drink from your lips, glistening
with stretches of tiny gods. Constellations marked by cosmic
skin. Nimble fingers thumb noduled sky to count dermal layers
of terse existence. Angry and mistaken, their tired eyes crest
waves of splintered shell and swollen tongue pearled
with marrowed longing; its slow encase a mere shattering bone.