departed the wicker squall despite its towering despair came the hallowed sun rising from a newborn east begone, you frozen lapse set to rhythm—one, three, five calculated areas of dread voids following metric syntaxes our tongues, dipped in silk our hands, wrapped in fire time stilled it’s beating heart and for a moment melted in us slinked away this cruel night did, afraid of the bone-dry rattle echoing across a knife’s blade straight through open windows









