Red lips
Crumbling beneath my fingertips.
Bones outlined, flapping feebly
Twitching restlessly like butterflies trapped
Beneath the thin cotton of your shirt.
And I kiss each rib one by one I
Walk in the space between the air and
Your lungs (every night in my dreams).
I touch you gently as if my very skin will
Do you harm. As if my mind will poison
Your soul.

Red leaf
Solitary on a tree of green.
Omens scattered like seeds thrown haphazardly
Into the wind: flushed faces in the
Frigid sun and wool to cradle my shivering
Senses.
But you violate my senses, pervert all
Innocence, transform goosebumps into tell-signs of
Pleasure or longing. And the seasonal chill is
Cast into the embers behind your belly.

Red jacket
Smothering loving covering is it
Cold there?
Do you remember what it’s like
To touch. To not touch. To never dare.
Or are you braver now than you were
Then and there.
I like to believe (to make myself believe) that
I’m better today opposed to yesterday.

Autumn is on its way.