Air-War

Buttermilk petals, butter yellow petals, and there is time this morning

to write about these buttercream petals. I left no invocation of yellow unturned;

I combed the metaphors out of Spring; I rolled away the stone but His body

was still there; Mustard is a blister I burst for the honey inside –

I deflowered my own childhood imagination in the process.

Every spoken word was chalk.

I began to hate the shimmy of cream

outside the window whenever the wind picked up

Those little kamikaze

petals,

though it was never

really about them, or butter, or

Spring. I just used you, I said.

Your sensuality turned me on.

I wanted something I have never tasted before to fill my mouth

such tiny pools of Sarin, mistaken

for rainwater collecting in each

buttermilk pistil,

were they to find my tongue – what would they make me say?