Boylesque

That summer, smoke gorged

itself on sky. Two silver

sleeves of “boy” flung fire.

Hungry ravines echoed the Stop—

don’t rush rock’s rough hewn

shrubs, O     Burning bush. That summer

was one after the last clearing

orange to blue, animal brains wet

as walnut slabs refusing to burn.

Between us—Stop. Look, if I could

pause the—O      Wild

here you would choose me over

a People, oiled blackberries purpling

our wet hands pressed to wetter

lips. Only you could stop the smoke signals

lisping through the rain. In the pause you could

ask: How do you autopsy a branch?

O      Ash already peopling the sky

that was the summer before

Anthropocene chic & if I could

freeze our branching away

if I could take dead coral off walls

if I could pull all of it back

To us      To ocean      To ice

O      What humidity would hold

still between us, our bodies luminous

as heat snapping through clouds

electric eels echoing elsewhere:

“O”      “O”      “O”      “O”