Disengaged
He no
longer communes with her body.
She's too
aware now of damage
his hands
& mouth have done. It always
aches in
her brains & bones, her splayed heart.
She can't
go back to longing that rose
in her
early twenties; fire intense around him,
wanting his
lust-love-fuck-love-lust.
She doesn't
tell him that
he is a
troll to her now, living under
the bridge
of her ribs, her shut-in desire.
She doesn't
tell him how she sometimes
burns the
edges of the pages in fairy-tale
books &
casts dark spells across his chest
while he
sleeps.
She figures
he should know somehow
by the sad
sway of her hips, by unadorned
eyes always
staring into dusk with the force
of regret
& pain,
years lost
& negligees
dusty &
shivering
beneath the
bed.
