A Crown of Dust

(a cento)

11

How a river disappears into the night and is never still.

I asked, have you ever been approximated, does it

matter,

"Here" is just a part of the soul your body shows to me.
and someone memorizing hard how to ask for it again.

You thought your hunger mattered

A fig eaten like a kiss in a stairwell. Your lips, potable wishes. 
          The quiet

to feel the flame of breath gutter but keep burning.

And what are your parties like without me?
But if you're waiting for me,

nine little black dresses and a birthmark
as if some vital clue needed to be found.

Let me love the cold rain's plinking.

The stones, twittering distantly, speak to me.


Line sources:
Chi Lechuan, Gillaume Apollinaire, Jennifer Nelson, 
Lisa Russ Spaar, Ada Limon, Paul Tran, Kendra DeColo,
Traci Brimhall, Lee Upton, Annie Stenzel, Lynn
Schmeidler, Edward Denniston, Maggie Smith,
Sarah Giragosian