By the river she is unseen, infinite and dark as the shadows roll across mirrored water. Where no one can see her, she undresses beneath the dead sun, her pale flesh glowing like snow. She is translucent and opulent, like shards of shards, dreamlike and swollen. The horizon lined with gums and tongues, redder than nightmares, blossoming like cancer as she displays her body. My hands reach for her, but there is no energy left within me. I’m broken, an empty vessel drifting out to sea. Floating like driftwood, a discarded memory of ancient childhood. Inwards and mosaic, silhouetted and temporary as she swims in pools of shiny oil. Fingers upon her thighs, fingers creeping from her navel to her breast. Like spiders, scuttling from the light. Rising up, then coming down fast, I dissolve her innocence. I’m open mouthed and distant, like the crumbling ruins of long forgotten towns. Fingernails painted with hushed lullabies, all those tears upon her cheek, reflecting loneliness and pain. Drifting in the rain, falling without sound as the bed sheets wrap around her. The warmth of no one, of tired eyes and banality. Streetlights and moonlight, cigarette smoke and the calling of years. Decades and centuries, born passive and mute. Stood in dust-filled rooms drinking cups of tea, swallowing repeatedly as the days go ever on. Anxious bouts of nervousness, tingling like love bites on the nape of your neck. The clouds that smother you, suffocating and heavy as she sinks beneath the surface. Sunday mornings with your arms around her waist. Kissing her ear, you turn her face to yours then slide yourself in. Spreading and pushing, lips and saliva linking with ease. Natural like lovers, away from the world and flowering. Sepia petals of lust, the scent of birth upon her breath. Against the boredom of all there is, the glance of hearts, secretly reveled when you thought there was nothing left. Darkness shining through the blinds, I wake from troubled sleep. Aching throats and headaches, melancholy and palpitations. Leaves of winter, hanging from broken branches. The chill air blowing through the open window, and the sound of life echoing from places unknown. Patterns in ink, symbols of sadness and missing limbs. The lost eyes of Sylvia Plath, watching me invisibly. The neon hue of ages, starless and submerging me with ease. Weightless, I’m neither here nor there. Wordless and transitory, tasteless. Moonchild they call her, bathing in the waters of tranquility. Singing to the animals as they gather round, her beauty overpowers all. Sighing like the breeze, she raises a light as the pools of oil ignite all around. Flames and lust, burning in awe of what she is. The chemistry of desire, the riddles of passion, found buried in the woods. In a haze of drunken wonder, I pull apart the walls of restraint. Breaking through the confines of man made hell, I become the stuff of wonder, of dreams and truth. No longer part of this realm, I travel through time and space to the places where I truly belong. And to belong, is all there ever is. In gardens once lost, she dances as I appear. The music of ghosts, trembling with excitement, sorrowfully smiling as we find ourselves once more.