by Ashley Cline
bring your own body. call it back from the
forest, call it up from the sea floor & watch
how the garden blooms her shipwreck tongue:
lilacs & oceans & isn’t it funny how everything
tastes of riptides this spring, you’ll say. & the
caramel spades you’ll make of my tongue, &
the salted currents you’ll lay along the flower
bed—listen how the garden sighs with her antler
fuzz & trapper fur trimmings left somewhere
among ankles & winter & isn’t it lovely how
a hungry mouth cares for such reckless lips?
you’ll say. & the tides you’ll prune; the
shark-toothed carrots you’ll pull from their
tender-earthed home & place, gently, belly
up, in the basket perched on your feral hip.
she’ll wait for you, there, i’ll say. this body
made of bouquets & drownings & the moon’s
magnetism. & oh, how you’ll undo my
cheeks along your palm—& watch
how easily the jaw sings of god.
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