Prayer

 

 

Cornered as any bed frame four ways

angled to hurt    have learned

 

especially at night I must be sharpest.

 

Sentinel that is not a sentinel

as the hardness of weaponry

 

only predicts the body’s softest plane

and dominates.

 

You, the nothing but the matter of

a breathing not yet sullied into breath--

 

nothing that hones to a point

or wants to not be damaged by its own use--

 

prior to its freezing, its descent into shape.

 

If you keep me molten always ready to ( )

dear breath   dear absence

 

coming via vegas, via anywhere

to a leaving of itself behind--

 

If you help me draw the outline of my own decease

here carefully unname its presence--

 

Here is a pen    o make it erase

Heather Winterer

Barnwood poetry magazine