i ran barefoot through her torso
now i am buttoning up her sides with silver thread
as she screams and kicks and breaks her wrists on my back
painting a mural in red;
“sweetheart, this is how you look best”
i don’t want her to hurt like this and i don’t want her to stop needing me
so i just sit and listen, criss-cross stitches
i am her seamstress

i heard, once, that vampires are vengeful angels
i don’t think i still believe that, i don’t think
i ever really believed that
but i don’t know what to believe
when she tells me
she loves me and she wants me here
i wonder how long i’ve been faithless,
fantasizing about burning witches
sitting cold and hungry as i sharpen my spear

i don’t have the heart to tell her the truth
tracing her fingers over my wrist, searching for a pulse
if only we could stay like this forever

we hold too many dreams for our bodies—
she knows how much it’s hurting me
she reads aloud eulogies
for the poisoned paint that i’m still inhaling the fumes of
and she tells me she thinks that shade of blue is pretty
i sit and listen; i must keep her seams from splitting

and she kisses my fingertips and hisses holy words
into the spaces between them
reciting something i don’t recognize; but it’s nice
she is mismatched cupboards
and drafty windows, and uneven floors
she is unlike any comfort i’ve ever known before