Desert (Three-Word Entry)

Desert.

An embrace, cold as the ice of my heart, of the weed and crack and crystal beauty.
An emptiness, the steel, hard machinery of death, holds me like clockwork.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick,
tick...
The droning of my last breath, my last vision of his skeleton hand and smoke-black hood.
A halo found so fallen it hits the bottom rim of his robe
like a resisting goodbye in the night.
I am the sully of your conquests, your victory, my wound-keeper.
Whisper, two, three, little secrets of youth in your ear and pray, due to that fill of trivial gossip that you may hand me a heart to play with.
These were not my promises for darkness,
I signed a dotted line to which obsession, lust would meet the forefront of my mind like an exotic dancer wooing the innocence of ballet.
I can't whisper, swallow more orange juice, or place more cards on the Spider Solitaire if not for expressing this before slumber.
So much I have been dying to confess, desert child
was it chocolate moose or strawberry tart you pressed against metal to pretty, pink tongue?
Have I lost those nights where things meant more than just a silence?
Have I lost the man, who was bright like the spaceship I drew for year three picture-day?
My friend, a whistle in the wind, the morning touch of water, the appreciation of the first green leaf after winter,
my friend, where are you? We're calling you home, from your Peruvian vacation that lasted so long, yet so short. A haircut on the epiphany of time.
I miss thee.
I miss the sparkle of a joy-kissed child rather than the longing and rope that has been hung to a heart that perhaps, in his young ignorance and innocence, he never knew he had.