ANNA PRESS

Wake up early, face turned up as if to the moon, 

Flushed instead, lambent, not too sweet. Outside

the crisp air reminds me how much I love

this sweater. I’m going to steal it

from you. Encircled by a cloud of mist,

fresh-scented and clean. 

Elsewhere, worries wither from lack of use, fray

free from the fingers. We make what feels good a ritual,

admit that it is hard, but even the effort 

is irresistible work.

Not like the world 

outside here. Not like the world we know. 

I pray I’ll return here a thousand times 

or more, where night turns mist into smoke from a campfire, 

freshly ground black pepper tossed 

down by a bored god or child,

where my hair is always sort of damp, 

but always feels clean. Without the shimmer 

of luck. Here, where the pillow is also a cloud,

where every wall sheaths massive windows between me 

and the outside. Tender leaves on time-scarred branches

remind me of you; delicate, vulnerable, unmoving only in sleep. 

To tell you the truth, 

I am not here at all. 

Lay your head beside me in bed or a bed of moss; 

douse me in emeralds or uprooted clovers

until the planet is scorched and dry, 

there is this—pleasure blooming from end to beginning again.