What you call a shower,
I call fire. I’ve come
this close—

ice and dust and desire
serrated against your cornea.

Friction is a terrible thing.

Trying to touch your face is like singing
as you’re burned at the stake—
a colorful prayer
of conversion—

a flaying

just to glimpse your back.
Your catatonic blue. Your god-iris

almost in focus. A cold ocean to slake
my incinerating question.