Not a one tells it this way, save me: the girl’d aimed to pull herself out
Of herself & skipped first to the lungs. It all fits; it all starts: a slim-

Jimmed doorlock. A lick-threaded needle, fed through knotless. I mean,
What gives. Hold hard & each one/thing slips through the fingers. Can you

Tell I carry inside of me the imprint my truck left on a 5 a.m. deer? We looked
Each other dead in the eye for a slow second & then a warm smack like a failed

Marriage. A bruise tried to cross me off, but only met me halfway. All bodies
A workshop of what isn’t anymore there. There’s loss & there’s talking

About loss, & one will stay immeasurable & one’ll world-without-end be looking
For containers to fill. One eyes the highball & sees the past as half-empty, half-

Spilled. Sugar, I can tell you’re onto me: I want you the way I want someone
Gone. Quick puff of day-moon just waiting to poke holes in my story. Half-mile

Through some trees to the nearest other. I’ll risk any path so long as
I’ve got my dog walking point. Like any driven girl who meets a wolf along

The way, I’ve got my talking points. The mistake is trying the first house you
Come to, door parted open like a close mouth deciding not whether but when

To kiss. Once I come-to, you ask me to set the table. When I say I believe I
Could tell you anything, you dead-pan & hand me a map of love that unfolds

To the life-size of love itself. Each dish you place in front of me features
Some sea animal I worry has the kind of bones you’re not supposed to swallow.