14/30

once they praised the queen of heaven
with epithets, tower of ivory,house of gold
so I would name you, gnawed-on end of all my days
bone and gristle kingdom
ship of my nights aground
island of sleep
my portable hills

queen of the skin's book,
laughing hellmouth, still pool
my starless dark, my velvet house
my effulgence of giant's fruit
my walled garden, mother of
these glass dolls, beloved

you are a heaven with lamentation
a multitude of flowers in iron
orchard of books, feast-table of my bed
you are my library mouse, my tea-cake
my honeyed knifeblade
song in the throat of thousands
artificer of jewels, handmaid of hammers
unscaled siren of this tangled water

they collapse around you,
the tiny wingless things,
their faces sticky with my heart
their tiny hands in your hair

in the garden, small plants wrapped against the cold
this three part song of your sleep, and you,
pearl and rose in the jewelbox bed,
you sovereign nation
you, song of my life and dying
you are my first and last light
my thread of dream, my first book of color,
my birdsong in the dark's tree
my named and nameless garden, my heaven's fruit
my phosphor, my quintessence
my ever burning bone's pyre, my limestone water
my joy, my life,my home, my love