We Are Devil's Food.

Take off the cracked coat and
release a flock of geese
from underneath my breasts.
The cotton,
full of moth hole-y threads
bare faces with light pink lip,
dry and touching
another pair that are not.

They sit on separate twin beds—
eyes nervously wide
glinting daggers
in the blue night.
Their hearts beat
to the rhythm of pond frog,
to moon shadows cast
on ancient silvery birch bark
on quilts made
during the Depression.

Rainbirds now birds
ratchet away,
their whirr dragged through
the languid open window
into open impatient ears.
Ratchet away
till dirt is ruddy velvet melting
devil’s food
under sleeping street lamps.
Miniature thundershowers
make a peaceful apocalypse
for infant spider embryos
under the power of automated sprinklers
that have never cared if centipedes drown
or not.