Still glistening, I rush in
from the wild country of the soul,
where jungle slithers
by moonlight, natives barter
with radiant ore in tropic heat,
all death’s vines hang
shimmery close, and the only way out
is when you offer me the cool perch
of your arm, nourish me
with delicacies worldless
and rare: shrimp the size
of palominos, macaroons,
the double espresso of your regard.
Unleash me, and I am an ocelot
all appetite and fur
stalking the far fields to snare game.
But now your hands are as strong
a truth as the moon, your hands
are steel ribbons hauling me back
from where it’s easy to forget
one’s way, or self, in the wilds
of that breathless, bud-breaking Amazon.