all your best monsters

First, you will pull your heart
out of your chest, feed it
carelessly to any wolf
that wanders by. Then,
you will fill that space
underneath your ribs with stars, a universe
so vast that it makes you
feel small inside your own skin.

You will begin to live
like a warning shot: all noise
and suggested danger,
no lasting heat.

Second, you will learn to lie
with things other than your mouth,
but your hands will keep
telling the story of your gone-heart,
wanting to break
every window, every clock,
every failed confession
until the pain sets in again,
feeling so much like relief,
a flood of otherness
that spins the absence
off kilter.

You will lose your breath
like an old arsonist: lungs
tarred with regret, fear pocketed
for safe-keeping.

Third, you will stop coming back
to this doorstep, even as you
return and return, harsh
in your routine, this practice,
this pretending, this dark—
it’s no match for this alarm,
its disclosure a wail
for the safety
of what is wild, the lips
of all your best monsters
begging to be kissed, intimacy
flinging itself against
your sanctuary
until you see it for what it is
in all its broken glory.

This is your warning
to get out
while you still can.

This is your reminder
that age doesn’t matter,
that nobody’s safe,
and that hearts are not harbors
where love is kept still, moored
and neat. No, that universe
between your ribs
is the chaos of new star—
and you are a constellation
of everything
that has brought you here.

That old wolf
is just your head, all teeth
and tricks. You may believe
you will never again
find your way home, but
what if
what if
home begins
here?