The Addiction that Ends Me

Her every moment was led by addictions to pleasure,
or pain, or anything proving she was alive.

I entered the stage in her final scenes,
our needs crashing into needs,
like the splintered pots at the village gates,
broken in reverence to her gods.

Our flaws became righteous together
as lusts grew lovely in their gratification.
Oh, the holy fulfilling feasts
amid her repeated deaths!

We lost our brokenness in the other,
two stories held in secret, stirred and
beaten down to the pulp of life.
She smiled, “Drown with me in this river of
unbridled passion. Be the addiction that ends me.”

Our tangled lives fell beneath the pounding waves,
desires refusing to relent until the storm had passed.  
I heard labored gasping for air,
but still we thrashed against the waves
until at last she lay silent beneath me.

I rose from the waters and looked at her lined face,
a broken vessel still holding me
within her fading warmth.
Would she finally be free?

Still firm and hot within her,
I dropped tears onto her breasts
as I felt her spirit departing in gratitude.