Poetry Month, Vanessa Angelica Villarreal (it might be a repeat)

 Corpse Flower
 ~Vanessa Angélica Villarreal

Yesterday, the final petal curled its soft lure into bone.
 
The flowerhead shed clean, I gathered up your spine
 
and built you on a dark day. You are still missing
 
some parts. Each morning, I curl red psalms into the shells
 
in your chest. I have buried each slow light: cardinal’s yolk, live
          seawater,
 
my trenza, a piece of my son’s umbilical cord, and still you don’t
          return.
 
A failure fragrant as magic. Ascend the spirit into the design.
 
My particular chiron: the record that your perfect feet ever graced
 
this earth. Homing signal adrift among stars, our tender impossible
          longing.
 
What have I made of your sacrifice. This bone: it is myself.

  

Copyright © 2018 Vanessa Angélica Villarreal. Used with permission of the author.