Fallin’ on my knees

like autumn,
a voice a little lower than
the angels’ callin’,
“I’ll take you with me
to the bottom.”

The devil’s sealing wax
revealed feels thick
like a warm b(r)other,
calling seeds above
in a fit of thunder.

My garden plundered,
it’s no wonder
my words want their
slumber—spent shells
mortared—under siege,

I beg my lord,
“Please, please, please!”
before I reach in
for another.

My inkwell drawn farther,
signin’ a release for love,
I seal and deliver up
what binds us to each other.
Coming to gather what

quick relief lingers—dangling
on a finger—prodding
a prayer, I let it drip there;
riding back to the yard baring
water for my maidenhair.

Little devils stealin’ through
the cuts in my cloth where these
little pearls absorb my curves;
consuming the world sprawling
my form’s frontier, each bee’s

swallowin’ my seas.

Takin’ my breath as a tax,
sweetly stings the track
makin’ its path down
the shaft where I mine
my devil’s sealing wax.