Lindsay Flanagan

The storm shivers in and settles like old age
the aspens shrug closer together in the fog
skeletons bent toward some unseen flame

Just as my own bones do when I see you
standing on an altar, arms outstretched in a holy cross
thundering your gospel, words falling over me like rain

Above the cloud-crowded sky the moon is a crescent
hanging to the fabric of the universe, trying to find space
in space, in the galaxy that was once my soul

Like the memory I hold of the veins in your hands
your fingers making movements like strumming of strings
scattering your stars, sending them into orbit across my skin

In the lune-light we are connected, body and shadow
mirror images married by vows of pen and page
strangers forever, somehow tethered by the ache you create in me