I, Clockwise

Back pressed against metal
Sick blue light kissed my skin, breathless
The heavy solemn clockwork of your heart pulsed beneath my palm
I dreaded the 8 AM departure that would ruin it all
So I took what I could, listening
I woke and saw the moon
Haloing your face
Just like a clock, measuring the moments
Measuring me
And your hands moved mechanical,
Patient, unstoppable, slow and deliberate in their path
Toward the center of my reality.
It was 6 AM
And I was like a traveler
Wandering without purpose
No direction
And no light to guide the way
No pinpoints against the vast and lonely darkness
Where the only sound was the echo of my footsteps
And so
Nothing could soothe the raw ragged ache
Or touch the bruised abyss I had become
Not without triggering a chain reaction
A thousand desert days passed
One by one
I cradled the vicious burning circle of the sun
Safe within my palm
I saw the path of my life traced on the back of a swallow
Circling higher and higher
Racing the sun
And I used the back of a black scorpion as a mirror
To scry my lover’s face.
And you were not there
I would learn to laugh again
To let my petals fall
To read my destiny in the vast clockwork of the stars
To tie the wind in a lover’s knot
To see diamonds crack in hot goat’s blood
And learn to love---
Without pain.

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