PAINTED LADY
The worst part
is how my thumb
could erase her
body but not
the nausea draining
her body down
to a dull hum,
her skin against
bone: the scaffolding
not around her heart
but the movement
of her heart wrapped
in a cocoon, the way
she emerges weeks
later, covered
in butterfly wings
folding and folding
in the kerosene sky,
finally refusing
the kiss, the spark,
the mere possibility
love could move
next door, never cut
the grass, not make
a big deal
when she lets her hair
down, I want her
to tell me I should leave,
tell me loneliness
is a compass needle,
a pencil tip, that
she is just a sketch
I trace with my thumb.
