comme l’automne

he traces his hands against my face

and he becomes the artist, I am the

masterpiece that haunts his eyes in sleep

he knew in a second, he knows me well

his mouth carves into my own

knife to wood he refines mine

in soft layers til he finds no flaws

he speaks with touch and

silent promises

his hands have seen war but now they learn

to have peace, softly and slowly,

unsure with gentleness like a new thing

his heart is undressed and it speaks my language

last year i was a monster, this year he teaches me

how to sing with my eyes closed, to hold and

to give, and how to live on even with broken pieces

he shows me shattered things, like

holy windows, dying trees, scattered sea shells

and he plants flowers softly on my skin

this was a golden sun after layers of winter

it was orange leaves after searing heat

it was

trying to describe warm colors for the first time

he tastes like cider and maple

on the trees i can't understand how i fit so easily

into his heart when the earth is turning

burning embers it is the end of an era, the

wake of something new out of the dead. my heart is an october,

a dead thing turned alive in a grotesque and

beautiful way. he speaks my

name like a vow

under the full moon, and buries

our hands against the bodies of crushed leaves.

the poetry we make is messy and voiced

like a shaking hand, but we both know that in

the sudden streams of scattered words we

are letting go, like leaf from limb, making a place

for something new, our bare arms

outstretched. something about the way his hands

branch out, reach for

me like empty trees to the sky begging for

life again. i knew that if we didn't last, like

many beautiful autumn things, the slowburn

way we died out would be all the more

lovely.