to love is pearl medicine
terrifying transformation
oozing grit and spit
unwinding to original aura
to love is unveiled garbage
poems in the furrows
a restless gypsy at the crossroads
earthward and earth bound
hardest homecoming
a house with the dirt still intact
i am covered in blood and shit
still beautiful unworthy
to love is to give up the ideal
find orchids in the muck
overcast freckled paradise
a ladder a painful door
you give me granite and agate
hard shine an eden where people eat
sleep fuck cry laugh
where we sharpen our pencils
to praise the ordinary
i resist it all
wanting evanescence
you give me the thick tang of reality
a cup filled with my own history
and evasions a choice
i’m rattling the bars of the cage
drink up you say drink up
by Maxima Kahn, first published in Tule Review
