touch

Rust and dust and cracked cement. Our particular music, all fingers and frets. Our typical song, callused kisses up and down the neck. The moon sinks into pools of stars, nothing left to jump or fall. Fences made of chains, fences made of splinters, midnight just leaning against the eaves. Every lock slides and clacks, every door huddling in its frame. Our usual tune always clattering with gravel and trash. The rough road, the lucky gutter.

I hold you too tight, pressing down the distance between bones. I hold you too close, pinning down your wings. Ribs and breath and appetites flexed with the tide. Your heart beat speaking through your shoulders and your throat. Some slip of the tongue, some rigor of the lip, that taste of teeth and salt. Fingers taking each measure, hands abandoned to the duties of livid flesh.

I awake to a hush, to lights left on and blinds drawn tight. Some loose conspiracy of bone and blood dispersed by the unsettled mind, the faithless chase, the brutal hunt again flying through the woods. Eyes open, and the tense shift of seeing as all these thoughts are dropped against walls painted with spider trace and artificial light becomes the word. I awake to a mouth full of teeth and words never shared. Every song buried in some dusk of crows and photographs. Every touch another star falling in smoke and cinders.