Here we are -- me,
looking at you
looking back.
You dip your head, do a little shuffle dance.
I get the question but you know the answer
before my lips so much as flutter.
You are an odd blue-black, luminous by moonlight
but a cipher at noon, or so you pretend--
our story begun at the bitter end.
You lit and left, lit and left the hollow place in me,
inspecting, appraising, always returning.
You gave me baubles and trifles as rent.
I gave you blood where your sharp parts went.
Here is my dead-womb where you rode
and taught me to mark faces that hold no light.
Screaming helps too. I thought it might.
I am the house of glass, you the burnt wick.
You are the mother of every line I write,
your call the ink I use, fragrant and thick.
We are yin and yang at each other's back.
Me, looking at you
looking back.
______
for Desperate Poets "In The Footsteps Of Our Feathers"
Music: Beth Hart "Your Heart Is As Black As Night"