You open your curtains

and all I see at first is that

painting of two sides of beef

flanking a screaming face —

but with edges clean

and sculpted by a surgeon.

A knowing slice down

the meridian of an orange —

the embryos in the womb

clearly wrinkled

at the stomach — faces

unformed — appendages

and sex, still lines of code

waiting in the queue.

You tell me, come closer —

to push past their oblivion

blanketed under powdery

cobwebs — these walls

won't bite — there are no teeth

in your gums. You say,

lie down — as you tuck 

the sun with a soft finger

behind your ear. I go to sleep

in your rising water — a perfume

of grass-jacketed earth clawed

up after a thunderstorm. That hot

mineral bath drowning my body

at the end of a terrible fucking day.