four poems about fire
Alex Zea, Europa Press
1.
In the story I write of the two of us, you are the ocean. Your current is mapped in the atlas. I drown.
2.
In the story I write of the two of us, you are the forest. The floor is tiled in viney refuse. I am led by old symbiosis to the canopy. The ferns teach me how to be nothing.
3.
In the story I write of the two of us, you are the fire. I remember I am ashes. I remember the way the iron soil arose from the core of the earth.
At the center of every flame is stillness. I sleep there and dream wicked dreams, persistent, relentless.
4.
In the story I write of the two of us, the tragic ending comes at the front.
Love has nothing to do with you. My interest is purely anthropological. The history of us is written in the substrata: the igneous conglomerate of words and minerals and plastic.
What makes you think you are any different?
Steam rises to the surface. The sky is thick with constellations. My bones beg for your attention. Our lips touch, not like the embrace of the familiar but like the heel of the hand on the hot stove, the pulling away, the slice of cool water on the burn, picking at the blister and scab, rubbing the skin until it is raw.
