Sweet Potato Haircut

I will go where you will go
untether
myself from tight ties to home
& roam, close behind (when we are
running) f a a a r in front
when we walk. I didn’t expect to love
you bright sunflower stem
boy stretching to the sky
where stars & sun rejoice
when you are close: when you are far
stretching for sun & those dewey
sky things I feel the absolute squashy too tight fullness of longing I don’t know of language large enough to tell you about that: instead
I will say it’s worth feeling even
when I bleed & bleed
& bleed into every tender and aching coffee counter conversation,
every innocent
ly idling notebook (lined or otherwise)
every gaze I give the grass
               hopper            sidestepping out of fra

me: inside of love twisting & bending
I am bared whole & I know
the risk for stains even
if it will never wash out like

when Lauren’s dog ran out into the nighttime street to meet the underside of a ruthless crush car tire & she held his mangled, gnashing face in her soft white hands & wouldn’t go to the ER even after he was dead so that her hands would forever remember his teeth, his agony enfleshed I want you to know that

I
will meet you when it’s time
I won’t wear white I will be sparkling
in this sublime blood of loving & pink
longing & I will climb your warm scar
red skin toward sun where we will perch
hands tangled & legs dangling over
a wordless atmosphere