for the tarnished hearts

bouquet of bullets

prompts: "clusters of calla lilies" "flames around your tongue" "bouquet of bullets"

this is a long one, so hopefully next time i can keep it short :))

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when the sun tips

saucers

of waxy light

down the valleys

and in the crooks

of the trees' tangled arms

covered in soft moss

and serenity,

i feel the tense pulsing

in my temples

ease into tired comfort,

just as the steady stream

carving through the woods

eases smoothly

into a glassy river

lanced with bent sunlight

where i gather

clusters of calla lilies,

sweeping them into my arms

like i have someone

to give them to,

someone who would press

the angelic petals

into the rough pages

of a leather-bound journal

that was once her grandmother's,

not letting them die

even when the love has

long since withered and wrinkled

like an old, papery hand.

but for now,

i run my calloused fingertip

along the velvet mouth

of the ephemeral blossom,

imagining it's a champagne flute

and i have gotten drunk

on the bubbling dreams

that hurt the longer

they stay,

because they are

sword-thin beams of starlight,

heroically piercing through

the darkness that shrouds me

like an angry fog,

but i haven't thought of

the star itself,

the hidden core of the

dreams

that chars my fingers

when i reach through

the blinding light

to meet all its sharp points—

spearlike, wicked tongues

with flames wrapped around

the curled tips.

i have stars in my palms,

in my heart,

in the building ache

in my throat

that makes every breath

a conscious choice.

is it dangerous to want

more than what you have?

to jump

even though concrete

is what waits for you,

and your spine

has become

bits of clinking porcelain

in the moments

before the fall?

but when i knock the risks aside,

they fall open

like russian dolls

with mocking, painted smiles,

revealing all that could've been.

this loss is consuming,

but i have been a supernova,

i know how to explode

before darkly morphing into

a black hole,

taking and taking and taking.

grasp at everything

as if it'll be stolen from you—

i know the ground

opens up

to steal the dead

from those who still

remember their heartbeats,

the falls of their footsteps,

and the lilts

in their laughs

that can make warmth bloom

in chests

as if a familiar palm

has splayed out against skin,

pressing feeling

into cold nerves.

in the end,

i abandon the eerie calla lilies,

leaving this bouquet of bullets

on the forest floor

—hoping no one comes by

with a gunpowder heart

and a smoking pistol of a mouth—

where no one

can hear the shots

if they ever do sound.

love,

mari