Gouge Out the Sun

i wonder if it’s sadism or ignorance           she comes by the seaside wearing nothing but swim trunks    

paleness stretching down her pelvis  

rib cage inflating slowly    cruelly

counting the dips in her torso one by one 

i know sadism to be the answer

my knees ache       jaw melts marmalade 

drooling down her neck  

flesh alive with daylight

nighttime hides its moony face   

                    i am warm

dawn perverts like a man       greedy fingers cupping her waist      

casual intimacy of sunday morning and  

feelings hissed through teeth

i wish to never see her again

the arch of feet hanging against linen    she wears my father’s t-shirt backwards 

weeping brass crackling over a handheld radio

frizzy eggshell curls draped over my nose

chet baker blames heartbreak on the moon

i blame it on believing I could love her

an imprint of her skin on silk pillows, i press my face in      and              breathe 

the sun is my ceiling fan         body alight with shame

  how dare she make me feel beautiful 

i don’t say “i love you”            out of pity            out of fear 

                          a consolation prize for a slut                            it echoes back 

glazed sugar on charred fingertips   i tear myself apart        sweetly

inferno rests on my spine, belly strewn open

chasm for summer to sink its molars into

feral tomcat puncturing persimmons

peel back my skin like a cicada

       make me anew                                     deserving of her 

my irises a child’s marble                                                              sticky     tumbling through grimy palms

 dirty serpent                     defanged                             a trigger useless without hands 

i hope she turns her funny face to the sky

sun cutting through her eyes 

and thinks of me