In a Rehab Center for Anguished Lovers

The gravity of your bed

Outweighs the gravity of Earth

Shackled to the duvet,

Burned into the sweat-filled imprint

Of your side-angled sleep

I can still see your profile in the pillow

Fever dreams of paradise and scorched Earth

Paint the windowpane like runny mascara

The black oil that dripped from your pupils

And fell as melted wax

Onto my exposed chest

Where it tattooed your fingerprint on my sternum

Sounds of outside have a foreign tongue

That were stenciled by an illiterate hand

And distorted by static

Have now cracked the blinds

And stained the curtains

As a free citizen in the sovereignty of this bed frame

The borderlands of your memory

Will reroute the hurricanes

These covers my only armor

From the corrupted rains

That gave way to the torrents

You appeared in white robes sans stigmata

Just as a deceptive angel would

With kisses that welded your sins into mine