Bloody Tender
In the womb of creation, we find ourselves intwined. Enslaved by a placenta-like atmosphere. Representing the lovers and their destiny. In a glowing red room, there is a deliberate fluttering of the heart. Cracks in pinon wood that conform to coals of the hearth. Love as carpet burn. Skyclad before a shrine of Venus. Bleeding.
Together, there is a ceremonial song composed of harsh breaths. Of bodies colliding. Of waters being realized as God. This is our salvation. Fires erupt around thought. Your skin is red and hot to the touch. You compare the beads of sweat on my belly to diamonds or saltwater pearls. I compare your skin to golden swords being forged on an open flame.
What comes to us both in this heavenly prison are thoughts of consuming. Standing firmly. Of a river simply traveling downward to find more of itself. But I find pieces of me in the rose-colored parts of your chest and in the greenish blood hue underneath your skin. We discuss birds being kept in cages and wing clippings. We talk about flowers being sent in place of spoken word. We know that each petal is deeply sentimental and contains the world’s intrinsic light. We know that they heal. We reminisce about standing still in nature’s language and of when we tasted flesh and bone in silence.
You re-open river channels with your hands. Re-arranging my organs as riverbed stones in the aiding of nature. Flowing deeper, covering your skin. Youth emerges from you, and you are red aura-coated. Traveling backwards in time with the spirit of inquiry. Every stone you move allows my river to see you more closely. As if you are transparent or apart of her. This practice is your sensuality. A touch that is meticulous and brave. The river finds herself satisfied inside the touch of a man. I hear her ask if the same satisfaction shines upon me.
It is punk rock to be this sensual. There is eroticism held in the richness of Earth along the river. Slightly wet and fragrant. A relatable breeding ground for new life. I am slowly moving as I taste. Wrapped in saddle blankets and a silk chemise. Cream-colored stays that lay flush upon my swollen belly. I bleed best in morning – onto scraps of wool and harshly woven cotton. Hearty moths are drawn to us now. The house of light within my womb and your praise of it in offerings of boiling water in iron cauldrons.
We are bloody tender. Our love existing in rarity. In delicacy. In the nourishment of all that is circulatory. A silent desperation for a warm handed touch. An everlasting simmer. We view each other’s bodies as necessities: a craving that satisfies yearning or a naturally repeating inhale. It was the same inspiration that summoned us simultaneously from an ethereal sky. Both living in a silent contemplation of a life’s work. Both of us drawn towards definitions of all through mountain ranges and patterns within numbers. Through movement, through a heavy handed, solid caress. Both bleeding when we are betrayed and clotting by our command.
I ask the river why the heat of sexual frenzy is forbidden. I ask her why this expression is said to be the root of all evil when it is the root of creation. I ask her to explain the ostracization of my own raging red river. She whispers that men breed desolation, and I am left with hands buried deeply inside of her. I grasp at branches in my balancing. I am covered in her mud and soaked through to my core. I am exposed. Tree trunks emerge as she and I form a potion. They grow tall and split in two – spreading wide like my legs do. You sleep between them as I drown in waters that are both the river’s and mine.
In the womb of creation, little birds are flying to the music of Venusian snares. When they land upon us, it is holy. We feel the velvet of flesh and soils soaked by clear water. Your heart is visible through the soft spots of your neck. I know you are alive by your blood flow, by your containment of the sun. You recognize me and the river as the same girl. You praise the moon as you taste me. I throw it back on my knees. They are bruised, my shins are scraped but valiant, but passionate in their wounding. Silver linings flow from us in divine rite. Bent over, whimpering. Nature never escaping feeling. A sublimation of hurt when we are tousled and rosy. When we are overheating to an array of romantic strings. Soft and long-drawn and flowing slowly. Rising and falling like your body into mine.
