I lean upon this door and feel the fabric of the wood –
splinter-down, cragged skin, brown crooked canyon marvel –
against my fingers and cheek. Try to
press my shoulder into it, make it ache
like stones in a path pressing their backs into the
bottoms of your feet, like the
weight of a wooden cross upon a ripped-apart back,
a shoulder scribbled upon in red, skin inscribed
by a whip. Try to press the door into
the valley next to my neck, and listen for the moan
of my bowed collarbone: but nothing works. I cannot
carry stars across my shoulders like you do – not in
this courtyard, where you handed me the knife
and told me to dig in.
Continue reading →