Aloe Blood

I don’t want Aloe blood

the translucent sticky wet

dries down brown red

Nauseating intimacy

I desire the Monstera I have tied up

in a pot hanging above my bed

it reaches for me

Edging closer

I want to be faithful

without prodding gashes

How do we survive these sacred wounds?

Stigmatizing hunger

The first time she comes

I’m bleeding, so I deny

I delude myself

Pretending not to need

But on walks around the cul-de-sac

I bend and break it at the stem

then slather the sap on my face

Cold Bayou

I bare my skin at your secret shore

with still water and white sky blindness.

Pure cloud.

No horizon.

My body

color of wet sand or bleached wood.

Yours

same tone as beach shadows.

Out of weed forests

I carry thistles in my skin

bringing them to be baptized at the cusp

an offering.

Moccasins twist tenderly

in a fishing line nest.

One liquid knot amongst

coquina and crawfish carcasses.

I want to be torn apart.

Open me, bleed me, heal me.

But I am down in winter water

half frozen and uninhabitable. 

Where I expect brine

taste freshwater.

December algae blooms

Do not enter.

Quiet and grey

a mirror clearly distorted.

I tread slowly despite

seeking you into me.

I am throbbing red

bruised and bitten.

Only by sand mites

bred in the Bayou’s stagnant water.

They are alive at dew thick dusk.

Reciprocity

A curse in my mouth

once uttered, the jelly spoils

Maybe they don’t want what I give

then why come with wet lips and open palms?

Adjust your expectations

A return is a sin

It may be easier for the camel and the needle

but I just want to break even

I resent the ledger and understand the armor

but we owe something to each other

The inability to sit with discomfort 

has been covered in buzzwords

We ignore the bonnet bee

until it stings the neck's nape

The honey and venom

wasted together

Libra Venus 

As I shuffle my deck

The Empress and The Emperor fall out

When it comes to love

I am careful not to curse

Like Bonnie said

I can’t make you love me if you don’t

And I would never want to force those long-fingered hands

that gently find mine under tables at Bimini Bar

I consider The King card

The Rider Reader asks me to tap into the divine masculine

I think of my mother half-lovingly calling me

The Son she never wanted

Or my high school counselor telling me

I hold emotions like a man

Yet, when the tears finally fall

there is no release

That can’t be all there is to masculinity

I look next at The Queen card

and the Oracle says to embody the divine feminine

I think of the pictures she texts me when she misses me

The ones with her face tilted up

the slant of her jaw cuts me good

Still, I know if I could reach through the screen

her skin would be soft to the touch

But that’s not all there is to femininity 

Venus in Libra

I want so badly to reach a perfect balance

looking for equilibrium in this five-card spread

But she comes for me even when I am intangible

So, I must be Holy enough