God's Eyelashes

Under a serrated night I dreamt of a fox for the first time. He saw me. He was me. He passed through me on the way to the wet woods.

The moon and his quicksilver gaze! A muzzled light, blushing through wax paper. In a thieving air, I remember I haven't seen the stars for ages. This and other truthful entanglements of time.

Aleppo and snow falling. We are the executioner's wife watching the systematic extermination of innocents. Remember whose bed you warm, wives; the nightmare honors no quilted sweetness or pristine sheets. Speaking of sheets, in another dream we almost made love while the rest of the commune was gathered for the hegira ceremony. We decided to play a game of cards first.

God's eyelashes fall onto my cheek. Winter this way. We are close but there is still room to lose lashes upon radiant faces.

In single digit temperatures, I fade under five blankets, drifting into the trackless shallows of summer's lakes. May I hibernate until spring, or at least until the sky mellows to rose milk sometime after 9 a.m.? And I miss the birds. It may be time to take things into my own hands.