i. precipitate
you are the sort of girl that hurricanes are named after.
i should have known you would rip me limb for limb,
hand my pieces off to the north wind.
i longed for the storm eye’s clarity
yet savored the calamity of it all,
relishing your cold drumming against my body,
your winds that tear me apart.
now i remember you only in the subconscious,
curves hidden somewhere subtle-
the place that harbors the first autumn breeze.
it comes back in little flashes,
always a surprise when you cross my lips
and tumble out of my mouth.
ii. condensate
she rises with the sun,
slipping just out of reach
and you are left to grasp at smoke and straws.
and in her absence, greedy girl,
you will gobble up the sun,
because you will still be hungry,
copper and blood dribbling out of your
slack-jawed mouth.
come moonrise,
she slips beneath the cracks under doors
and back in between cold sheets.
you always let her in,
won’t stuff your towel under the door—
tomorrow, you’ll tell yourself as you hang it back up.
you will hold her, worship her while you can.
wrap your arm over her stomach,
hope it will keep her there when the sun rises.
iii. evaporate
her pupils are saucer-wide, squinting into the mirror.
summers are always hard, coaxing the geyser out of her.
she’d like to think the heat would dry her out, but it’s humid here.
one foot out the door and she can’t escape the sweat.
she’s becoming soggy, she thinks,
a little too soft around the edges to be this young.
every eruption pulls silt and sand with it, the geyser only gaping further.
her eyes melt, face swimming in the mirror
and she can tell another eruption is coming,
that hollow feeling filling her up again,
creeping into her mouth and holding down her tongue.
she turns from her water-bound reflection,
already so used to this wasted dilation.