Nocturne for Last Night’s Wanderer

it’s the witching hour

and my fingers are still smudged with

Palo Santo — gifted and burned

carelessly, over one more 

blooming and naked body,

before the moon even completed its rise— 

still the sound of wind’s moaning 

sliding over my ceiling. 

It’s not the sharpness of charred wood,

rather the notion of smoothing, of fading— 

the unhinging at my hand of another past 

pushing forward into future. It’s that I’m tired 

of being named Bearer of New Beginning

and loosed conscience, my bed a pitstop

for restless lovers seeking — what?

Knowing? I’m tired of slowness

slipping clothes and confessions off 

in the night, unbuckling one more secret

to drop on my pile of overflowing names.

Tell me you love me at noon on a Tuesday,

eyes meeting, bright, over bags of sunflower seeds,

leaving trails behind for tomorrow’s birds.

AS ORIGINIALLY PUBLISHED IN SOLSTICE LITERARY MAGAZINE ISSUE 1: VOL 1, NO 1.