I Was Once Yours

I was once yours Take this photo for instance...a toothless girl on the back of two legs. The folded side is you! That day we shared an ice cake sitting on the bench. Then I went running, shooing the birds feeding on rice grains in the swept yard. On another day, we scoured the forest for dry cinnamon wood and you reminded me of Christmas. The casuarina branch we cut trailing behind me like a fat broom. We sang our songs which echoed off the trees. I kissed the coco plums before eating them. Something in me grew silently then, but not around me. Madness came with the absence of serenity which in you lurked. Emptied my belly of all fire, feeding me with myself, more than rage and spite. Many kisses after that bore no sweetness. I kept looking for sincerity in rivers where everything plummeted down, where tenderness holds no hands and hearts are debris in crazed currents. Then, I remembered, looking through the glass, this is the day you scooped me up, the day you pushed flowers into my seams. And we went trudging again, telling tales of dragonflies in the rain.