I have come to touch you.
To put my fingers in your hair - oh!
it must be thick and strong
does it stretch or curl? - run,
through parting until somewhere, there,
I feel little depressions where a crown was once fitted.
I have come to touch you.
To run the side of my thumb down your spine - oh!
It must be straight as an arrow
each vertebrae precisely placed - stroke
and find a story everywhere, there,
written across your back in rivers of scars and hills and mountains of knotted flesh.
I have come to touch you.
To slide my palms along your shoulders - oh!
how strong they must be, they bore, the tree and the world - rub
gently down your arms until there, where,
your slender wrists met the forge, there,
there is my heart become stone.
I have come to touch you.
To bow low and reach for your feet - oh!
how beautiful they must be, we,
deign to wash them? - touch
the tender place there, somewhere,
where in roses
sprung in indescribable perfection of
torn tissue and ripped muscle, spouting
spewing, spitting blood, blossomed
everlasting life.