you
press me with my limp languid green/brown dress
against the lamp-post
a stain in the shadow, colored stencil on the brick
walls. free of your grasp i
collapse, transfixedly abducted into a corner
of your crinklycrumpled shirt; lying fully flat
on the cold concrete, i am helpless:
towered-princess. and for the first time i notice
how dusky
fairy-pixie-talcum-light scatters on my

barefeet.
my heat disseminating steadily,
sliding off the tips of toes where they burn
scars on the pavement
doused in potion spilling out of open vial,
unnoticed.

pasted; a warning 'wanted' sign waiting for
a stranger to reward,
leaves weave lightly,
wreathe moonbeams
and thread starchy dirt within my hair--
in out-in out-in
i un-stick and leave (my lungs
like breath.) out-
to look for
another stranger to reward.

barefoot: so she
more-than-softly
swiftly
lands on the ground. picks up
splinters from over-grown entwining vines
and wood thorns. tame them,
render them submissively
speechless.

barefoot: so she runs faster,
tempt, roil the wind to
sift through her skin while the
earth licks her feet,
a balm to charm, to soothe and heal
the numb.

barefoot: so she slowly
dissolves into the infinitesimal blur.

barefoot: so she knows where she's going.
never losing, never
tripping, never
caught.

but if you did;
with sweet sinewy stubbornly strained intention.
return to hanker for my affection.
catch, clutch, clasp:
after i slice away, sever myself.
you will sear through me,
a quick-silver sore on my skin,
you share your magic like a sin.

(barefoot.
my heat disseminating steadily,)
Nymph is mercurial;
she bleeds like a unicorn.