Butterflies with hand grenades

We slow kiss    
   
your lips are gentle    
and undemanding    
until my body    
shakes with    
with heatwave frostbite    
   
you take my    
face in your hands    
and learn    
my mouth    
as if you had    
forever to trace    
the contours    
of my soft    
pink lips    
   
but a breeze against my    
sun-kissed shoulders    
makes my stomach flip    
and my heart race    
and the romance of it all    
turns to black-magic candy    
that I shove in my chest    
by the fistful    
until I’m    
sick enough    
to grab the    
collar of your shirt    
   
and make a small    
broken sound    
in the back of my throat    
while I sag against you    
   
needing more    
   
or less    
   
or I don’t know    
   
or I don’t fucking know    
   
my body is restless    
against your calm    
seduction.    
I want to shove you    
against the wall and fuck    
the threat out of my heart    
   
because the summertime    
romance trope    
is seriously    
fucking flawed,    
   
you make the butterflies    
flip around in my stomach    
   
but my butterflies don’t come    
with feathered wings    
and flower crowns    
and sweet new awakenings    
   
they come with machetes,    
black lace,    
and criminal intention    
   
they come in a paranoid    
pineapple-shaped explosive    
with the    
pin already pulled    
so it blows up in your face    
as needy shockwaves 
    
simultaneously    
scrabble at your zipper    
   
and I’m loaded with    
those winged-devil    
feelings    
dancing in the    
bloody field of    
what was left    
of a heart    
   
I can’t breathe    
from the weight of    
their wings    
cutting my lungs    
as if desire    
were a cannibal    
gnawing    
through    
my sternum    
   
and I can’t do fucking    
anything but run    
and scream    
and swoon    
and trip on my    
untied Altras    
   
to fall into    
your arms    
   
fuck    
   
(sigh)    
   
Fuck!    
   
you’re patient    
   
and I’m insane    
   
so kiss me    
with your calm intent    
while my insides    
beat my ass    
in panicked    
acquiescence    
   
and I’m sure    
that we’re covered    
in a hail of monarch    
wings as I lean in    
and we slow kiss    
lips starved and    
undemanding    
   
and I’m sure I have    
butterflies in the    
everywhere    
as my eyes flutter shut    
and I let go    
into your beautiful    
embrace    
   
and I’m sure…    
   
   
   
I’m sure    
   
   
   
   
about you