Doesn’t each skeletal homecoming feel like an offering
that haunts the silent garden?
I water the shark skin I float against
Wished I hadn’t ripped down the garden
but what am I to do to stay in tact?
A floral birthday cake bubbles up
on this airless morning
wounds burn in all ordinary ways
the smoke can be smelled from miles
Sticky blueberry syrup foam pressed against the sick
I experiment with a playlist around my neck
for all voiceless occasions
like there is a duty to protect what is left
I vacate my veins, fire-breathing in my blue dress
a handful of oranges in my lap
There is you in a stream of passengers
less and less recognizable
once coated in bandages, you unlaced yourself
to bone and attached yellow ribbons
on the rusted wheels along my pulse
We hunger on an old pallet couch
fending off clickbait by the crackling fire
thickening arsenic-hued petals grow around us
It is your turn to brew coffee in darkness
but your galaxy poured out to forget
A.M.P is the author of Anima (dancing girl press, 2018). She has contributed creative work to DIAGRAM, New England Review, Haydenâs Ferry Review, among others. Born in Bucharest, she currently lives in Zurich.