strangle the names
by which you’re known
choke them in the windpipe
before they write themselves as stone
put the flames out in the eyes
that see you in the mirror
you are not what you perceive
or even what you’re told
but more than can be grasped
by the limits of the mind
there is no body to confine you
no shadow to slant away
and then fall short
of what you’ve tried to be
butcher the yous you know too well
and dress them out
stalk the ones you’ve tried to tame
but could not reach
if you cannot die each night
you’ll die one day before your time

I have put those stories
in little houses in my head
and then like Olga
I burned them to the ground
and my ability to ignite
those wings to infectious flames
is what will canonize my name
those massacres I made
on the villages of me
and one day the you
that belongs inside my head
will place a pigeon in my hand
and I will set it free
and you won’t live here any more

days that look like nights
and the snow blots out
the wink of sun
and everything is given
to the glass-eyed moon
unanimated through the naked trees
and I love it vacant
don’t you know
so my next lover
will have no soul
no primal wounds to cut my lips
but he’ll be pretty
so pretty it will fucking hurt
like staring at a star
when it’s already dead
and I’ll forget
every chance I gave you
to remember who I am
until I forget it too
and he won’t care to notice
I’m also dead-eyed as the moon
but incisive as a broken life

I burned my fingers on the moon
when I plucked it from the sky
not because I love you
it’s only what I do
and you could mistake
the blacksmith for the devil
for the blackened hand
and some nights to wrestle demons
for matters of the heart
and others to make the mischief
is the greatest one can do
and I am absent from your courtiers
away and playing fool
the devil or the forger
who danced away the moon
a little to amuse you
a little for the light

I become the bride
of Zcerneboch
this night
and cannot belong to you
the keeper of the light
but we are still the same
and while you are raging for the life and joy
I embrace this ancient dying
which is not the same as death
but just as overdue
under winter constellations
that already are reserved
for the wedding feasts of crones
when women learn the pleasures
of not owing up their beauty
but owning their darkest parts
and all of it untouched
but dirty still
with no one who will wash
our feet
to bless our resurrection
but we will be reborn in other maidens
after their petals turn
and I will not be yours
until you great Biloboh
have learned to keep the promises
you had made once
to your younger self
that you had no need to make
because while I die
and you dance on
everything is moving closer to itself
in the diametric dream
so drink and dance and sing
for this betrothal I have entered with the dark
all things are only seasons
while branches hunger for the earth
as much as roots must drink the light
so some nights I play the subterrane
while you’re illumination
and then sometimes
we change the part
and you are my Zcerneboch
and I am mad and dancing