my  mother asks about  you at dinner. 

neighborhood august is smoked slow,     she says,   sweet, as if  we’ve always mistaken fingers 

for   barbecue &    held damp noses   to   grilled palms. 

in paper blinds      are   shutters:   white poster-board   against mesh grass.    how I know 

each   and 

every grain of this field.     how we have packed   aged moths in lip balm containers.

learned 

to spiral silk    through these   charred   fingers. 

I do not know where my arm ends   and yours begins.   ceramic eggs   we’ve fractured, shaped under glossy feathers.  a    birdbath made of  a split   spine.    a flower consumed 

through a   skeletal gaze. 

I play    you in fragments  like a broken vinyl      or maybe     a cassette we buried in 

bedrock 

once.           I    only    remember you in     bones and stems.    how     you bled    out on 

my    desk 

in melon undertones.       how     I held you    for safekeeping.    how we   tendered in the 

dark.