Pre-Love Poem

Remind me to tell you something about the wild things all around us. The shocking flash of white when the jay spreads its tail feathers. And the word, saudade, for which there is no English translation because the longing. I feel saudade for a home that does not exist yet. I live in the hyphen between here-there. Between Madonna-whore, Bitch-goddess. (You might remember that.) Join me there, the tidy hyphen space, for a little ice tea with mint in a frosted glass. Hard laughter on the side that pummels the muscles. Sleep talk is a patois only the beloved can decipher. I bury bones, excavate, strip fur or feathers for clean calcified remains. The heart stutters, stumbles on words boomeranging throughout its chambers. An owl rests between my clavicles, spirit-gift, joy-prompt. It moved there from my palm, hidden until a magic man discovered its presence. A hawk this morning stares me right in the eyes, maybe he wants to move into the skin. A coyote sprints across the wooden bridge J built over the dried-out stream, but the dog and I walk on unafraid. And the granite walls grow lichen, a world where two organisms function as a single, stable unit. The harvest moon was there, right where you told me, I only had to wait for it to fight the clouds and strut her way over Lanesville. I only have to wait myself out. If I could I would blood-let enough to quench the desiccated trees, their leaves curled in like palsied palms. But enough sacrifice for now. Red wrigglers survive winter at the bottom of the compost pile. That's got to count for something.