The bones you burden belong to the forest
And the swollen eyelids that stare through
Your charcoal-coated lashes are like a nest
Of unfettered vines, tethered to the ocean.
Your saltwater tears are swept into the rain,
Burning into the skin you bear with the surface
Of a plum plucked from its branch after the
Late-moon harvest in a snow-quilted autumn.
Fickle is the way your spine caves in to the
Pressure of stones within your brittle marrow,
Hollowed out from untethered ground and sky.
The dirt and grains of sand become a part
Of your lungs that withstand time until those
Blood-borne veins of yours boil to an inferno.
Your unsteady heart is like that of a fawn,
With feeble legs for muscles that tremble
Upon waking. You breathe in a desert of
Moonlit and sunbathed skin pooling into
The oasis that is your star-embedded eyes.
A field of wildflowers unfurl inside
Your desperate lungs, aching for the
Tainted air below the mountain lakes.
Your limbs are like a river that bends
To the rising tides of an unknown sea,
A vast darkness inside the slow-rotting
Blood and flesh as you taper wilted petals
From your tongue, a cavern of tainted nettle.
This freezing, burning cage made from stars is
What you call your body, a nature belonging to you.
A life for your earth-infused bones.