She was cinder born, the girl you met –

curate’s egg smashed to ash.

She couldn’t weaken her heart to hold

something of herself –

an arm underneath her skirt,

turning her this way and that,

through her jaw –

ammunition for section.

She was rough for love,

dragged slate, flint ticked,

a quarry of crashes –

nose, cheek, fractures of kisses

a lost eyelash singed

fever sped,

and a hand that brushed her away.

 

But she wasn’t.

 

She was bent, a dent

of millipede feet –

the stamp of a heretic repeated.

A trail of bristle thick

paint, the tongue wet

art of Narcissus.

Always tilted back, offering her neck,

she was a nest egg.

Always leaning forward

on her mascara smudged knees,

she was a kick.

 

But she wasn’t.

 

I dreamt of you last night,

but I couldn’t see your face.

Back to back in a coffee bar,

these things divide – time, grains of sugar,

a meddle of fingers, messed wine lip

words -

I said something to you and you heard.

 

I wasn’t her, the one that died –

her back snapped on the pouring of water,

a soft petal, sleep cured for your eyes

welcoming into the light,

my face, my hands, my voice.