Gem & I

We had read too much Sylvia Plath,
and seen too much Sally Mann.
Unlikely bedfellows, you and I.
Our mind was shrouded -
or was it infinite? -
echoing the incessant pounding
of tumultuous thoughts.

In that suffocating darkness
we laughed.
We set fires -
what we had read, red.
It burned our tongues
and left us blistering.

Our directions were misleading,
weightless we floated -
following smoke signals.

You know what they say:
two can keep a secret,
if one of them is dead;
As we were,
so devoid of empathy,
enveloped instead in ashes.