The Phosphorus Stars

      The phosphorous stars at your fingertips flower and pinch me, 
      Awaking dark milkyways like hidden veins 
      Throughout the sulking valleys of my breast. 
      "Throw the stars up! Again!" 
5     Our serious laughter catches in the ceiling's maternal plasters, 
      Soft as the stars that have ached to arrive there. 
      I lie on the dazzled bed as on a silver pond, 
      My heart a dry pine tree reaching after the sky. 
      Fed pure starlight by your fingers 
10    Anxious and cool as grapes, I shiver against you 
      Shaking the slender constellations from your hair 
      One star at a time. I swallow the tornado of flame 
      That still hides its little blossom of light, unborn. 
      I escape out of myself, dangerous, I run away with the night, 
15    Anything, anything to trace the deep absence 
      That falls backwards into your eyes like a diver. 
      The small, mobile flagellants of your eyelids unlace me, 
      Make me plain and open as a burst fig. 
      Narrow-footed cats dance on the shards 
20    Of the steep glass-crusted cement wall to view you. 
      I hunch in their shoulderblades, and spray with their sex. 
      The moon comes out of my mouth, a swollen white tongue 
      To give you this mysterious poem.

 

From the collection "The Rose Lasso"

Written by Gregg Glory [Gregg G. Brown]

More information available on gregglory.com.