Light Me

LIGHT ME

preferably with the same flame

that licks the bowl, by which I mean 

may it be less a burning-

up and more a breathing- 

in. Brief in-dwelling of our lungs,

may this encounter then become—

with discipline, consistency— 

habitual, that I might even be shaky

in its absence. Let its very presence

clot thick around the membranous   

tissue, so thick the two are inseparable

enough to merit a diagnosis—inoperable. 

Let it whisper to me—dried as I've

become—as it whispers to the barn-dried

leaf, and further, might it say something 

comparable, like, “from here on 

out let your very breath be aromatic," fused

with maple, almondine, or in this case,

                                                     You.