A New House (An Old Past)

I’m sitting on my knees, praying

At the temple of your sweet face.

The dark windows ensconcing the

Plaster walls. Humility tames

Me, trammeled by inconstant winds

And mesh curtains, of black fineness.

A bitter sweetness lingers in

My mouth, under the stapled tongue

And the iron banks of my teeth.

The sheer blue sky is deep and wired

By the transient straps of God,

Pent up in your glistening cells.

The hollows of your skin, which I

Traversed hungrily in early

Morning like a starved child released,

Bear the shattered stillness, the pain,

The red and black sorrow that I

Left tattooed across it like the

Soviet emblem. My own grief

Held deeply inside, like the blood

I have shared with each lover.

The blue bruise I bear, like a kiss,

Is the godly hue of your fine