cataclysm ovenbird The room is closed and dark, though the morning is already pulling up to stand, ready to fall face first into noon. I feel your presence in the tangled quilt, find the shape of your listless limbs, tuck my body in next to yours, pull your arms around me, kiss your nose. What would rouse you, ever so briefly, from despair? I touch the remains of the morning to your lips: butter, flour, sugar, eggs, ripe banana, salt. We could go and stand together, bare feet cold on the kitchen tile, and sink our teeth into something warm and jam kissed. (At the foot of the bed: clean towels folded and stacked, fresh sheets floral and innocent. I wash my face at a sink scrubbed to gleaming, drink glacial water from the tap.) I want you to come with me into the afternoon. I want to tear down the curtains and shake out decades of accrued dust and unsettling dreams. But for now I let warmth move between us. Your mouth, where it touches the place between my shoulder blades, shifts slowly into a smile. I want your joy to move straight through me. I want to give you just one day that’s worthy of your beautifully cataclysmic heart. 251121 what's it to you? who go blather from