confetti

it started with the first time

i opened the closet in my new

bedroom. paper flecks bursting from

behind the door. they had been waiting

all millennia. you helped

me pick them from my hair but even

weeks later we’d still find pieces

in between teeth — under tongues — 

on shoulders & lodged beneath fingernails.

you were always so gentle as you’d release

them out the window — same as you’d do

for a spider. when finished with

a rainbow it is the task of the youngest

angel to put it through the paper shredder.

he crouches in the cloud mist — taking

handfuls of the body’s remnants.

he learns not to weep after years of practice.

the first rainbow he shredded was that one

that we tried to follow in your car — 

driving around wet fallen trees — mist

rising from the asphalt. we never did get there

but we did stop for ice cream. you bit

the bottom off the cone. the sound

of the rainbow’s destruction was only a dull

static noise to us down here. i noticed

it but didn’t want to tell you. the next

time i was tearing open what looked like

a credit card offer in the mail & out

came the confetti. we had just stopped finding

it on everything — gushing like an artery

i covered my face until it was through.

mounds upon mounds of color. stole the rake

from my aunt’s shed we had used to rake leaves

in early october before the weather gave

herself over to frost. i resisted the impulse

to make the confetti into piles to leap into.

you were coming over & i wanted to be

clean. the next time we slept together

i transported myself somewhere else as you kissed me.

sat on the collarbone of the rainbow as

it was shred along with my hair. me, with the

thousand-piece body. me, getting blown

away by the first breeze. me, inhaling

the tears of the kneeling angel. i came

back to the room when you knelt,

spitting paper out of your mouth. confetti began to

pour out from behind my lips, miraculously dry.

each time i tried to apologize more came out;

you, naked on the bedroom floor trying to dispose

of the colors as they came. flow mountain spring.

flow slit neck of a pig. flash flood &

flow melted ice cream down to our elbows.

by the time it stopped your fear turned to anger.

slammed the door as you left & there i

was with all this color. i put some in my mouth

but it was too bitter too swallow.

if i don’t kiss anyone this won’t happen again — 

i can keep it a beautiful secret. routine:

each morning removing the piles of cut paper.

when you come over i sometimes find them on your

skin. you don’t notice so i kiss them off

your neck. i’m trying i’m trying.

i peel the rainbows free & roll them up like

yoga mats in the closet. the shredding has

gotten so loud — i ask you if you hear

it & you shake your head, unknowingly.

i can’t stand it — i can’t stand it.

caress this color out of me.