Forest/woman/alone
The smell of wet clover.
The waves of birds: trill trill.
Some animal makes a shuddering sigh.
A bee furrows, checks all sides of the petal
like pulling a neckline over a shoulder.
Oh, I should
have brought
my knife.
hands like slow birds.
For my self-preservation, shutter-eyes only; blink, blink, to capture every angle exact.
My hands, so gunslinger nervous.
Open fingers; shut into fists, close around pencils,
and awaken her instead in paper margins, compartmentalized: comet hair; sugar violet eyes; tulip face; hands like slow birds.
I fixate on every profile; every bitten lip; the curve of her back when she laughs; and how my heart is folding, and how I allow it,
for the first time ever, while gripping hard the part that that longs to wrap around, to feel her sigh against mine.