the morning is a piece of rhubarb pie.

the evening hides until it’s almost too late.

* * *

Somewhere along the line you learned how to unbutton buttons. Push them. Open them.

Let the starlight in, but not only. To love the starlight, respect it, praise it for swimming in the lake, for its independence.

Moving past you in kitchens, feeling on my fingertips days in this place that will never be spent, and, through desire’s glare like glittering lines of late-afternoon light refracted off the summertime lake, wonder how much they are worth, how that worth will be affected by time. Accrue or depreciate.

* * *

apricots. rum. peat. cream.

* * *

I did look in your eyes. I did wrap my fingers in your hair. I did say I love you. I did know what it meant.

* * *

We both live with music in the next room. The door closed. We won’t say it’s not there if asked, but we don’t put a sign on the door, don’t tell casual acquaintances about its color, how it tastes almost like blood at 3 A.M., how loud it moans, how much louder it can scream, how it whispers always.