In the beginning, I bit back mosquitoes. Belly itch and low drone
all through, the humming wait of late June in me. You called
from all states, told heat lightning veins Kansas, solid, soon.

I sketched your outline in espresso grounds—gave your eyebrows
a narrative arc—traced my forearm to remind you there is a kind
of atomic resonance in touch. Held silence like séance.

Sitting vigil on a marble slab [except it was less vigil than penance
less marble than pumice] something volcanic sloughed
off to sit with me skin to skin, a molting gargoyle.

I have compressed. Made the small of your back still smaller
pulled my ribs into cages and slept, lone growing.