with a title from Jens Lekman
I want to begin by telling you I was a child
unnaturally obsessed with dying. But no—
though God pulled the drum of my skin so taut, its song
rendered my body foreign to itself, my fixation
was wholly natural. And though a seed always
already has all it needs to bear fruit, this winter
runs so long my toothsome eyes worry the sun
has finally abandoned our shared sky. The night
teaches me with its jaw to distrust
the quiet of my shores. When I can almost see you
across the tides, I want to tell you this: I am iridescent
the way the puddle pooled in the gas station is iridescent—
God-fearing, awestruck, spanned open, and waste all the same.
I’m telling you this sadness has a better name.
