Thalia

In summer we drink rose wine    
under a purple twilight. I am    
haunted by the harsh slant    
of cattails slicing the wind.    
All gilded butterflies and the girl    
dissected. How she wants to be    
a house, a door, a mouth.    
Falling open, pink as ache. He’ll    
lose himself in her rooms,    
that wire trim, faint gold etchings.    
We itch to learn    
the horizon by texture.    
By tenderness. The way it speaks    
of velvet curtains and red-sequined    
pasties. Later I'll smell    
of persimmons, raindrops    
on a woman's spine.     
She waits for the children    
to leave before she cries    
so they won't think      
this is love. In June
my white lily throat bared    
in supplication. Its sweet  
un-interruption. How I tasted  
the earth when I licked    
every part of you.