my body moves to you. my eyes—

wild and marble things—crave your search

and seizure, they dream of peace. the dry desert

of my mouth gasps for your cool quiet calm.

but my heart—the bastard. it is an domesticated,

feral organ, made from another fiber. it says,



Unravel me. show me your spark

and i will show you mine. you are warm,

but you have not yet learned how to burn.

scorch my body, singe my lashes. understand:

i want you to destroy me.

it says, Leave no village untouched. pillage

my safe places and blister my peace. match me

in battle and teach me respect, to give

and to take—the in and out of love. you are mistaken

to think i want to be safe.

You see--it says--i have a bad habit. i fall in love

with oceans, with wildfires, with earthquakes.

oceans who swallow me and spit out my bones

without ever knowing my name. wildfires

born from a singular spark who devour

everything i am as kindling for their perpetual raging.

earthquakes who level everything i have made.

do you understand.

at the center of safety and suicide,

you will find me. flash me your weapon

before sliding it where i cannot see. say:

I dare you. the breathless tightrope walk

between danger and fatality.



this heart, it is not from here. it eats passion

whole and picks its teeth with the bones.

it says, If you want me, you must take me.

there will be no shy blushing hands and quick

fragile kisses to the cheek. no simplicity,

no softness, no straight ahead. hang me

by my ventricles, string me up by my ache

and sing with me the song of high tide.

draw your sword. love is not holding my hand

in an unbroken traveling. it is violence, abandon,

it is the warring of two raging titans.

understand: you will not survive me

if you don’t stand and fight. meet my red passion

with yours of a different colour.

fell me with one foul swoop and take what you want.

there is no other way.