sunset gardens the sky with stars, ripening them
for harvest, while underneath, streetlights petal
us golden, youth peeling from our skin like
perfume from a meadow bloomed with flame.
breathless with desire, I unfold into the city that
skims innocence from my scalp, the city that
pilfers our love, tucking it beneath lost strands of
my mother’s ink-black hair. & tonight, our howls
echo through the glades of her iron forest,
beckoning to the oily slick of dark that crawls
across her gilded canopy. her heartbeat
sharpening against our throats. our laughter
glittering her skyline. when the night has curled
into itself, slipping from jagged shades of violet
into a dulcet hue of indigo, we find ourselves
drifting along the concrete beltway, where,
blushed with rebellion, I blossom into your
welcoming embrace. outside, the wind tenderly
soughs through pastures of shattered glass,
glinting starlight, acrid exhaust, skyscrapers
massaging the sky into daybreak. the song
abandoned in the hollow of our throats at dawn
calls the question of freedom: once unshackled,
what do you do with your two hands?