Restless now,
I grow easily.
Feeling myself
(swollen tongue)
as your riddles slide
over and through me.

Softer now,
lips that pout and pucker
and place themselves,
ever gently,
​onto little lies that
are kissed out of existence.
​(We pretend.)

I can't take back what is not mine,
but I can watch wistfully as the clock ticks,
as my hair stands up on the back of my neck,
as the clouds gather in the west.

I could count on my fingers,
but they're tied up in other things,
or following laugh lines in your hands,
neither an invitation nor prediction.

​There's no sense in trying to get beyond
the midnight flickering of mad men and magic,
of moving any further than the mountains,
and praying for an avalanche.