You will be famous, your mouth
Staunched with a marigold.
You will be remembered like
The ache of a kicked shin,
Or a bruise rising under the skin.
You will sustain
The perilous loneliness of a profile.
Knuckle, throat and eye
Will be flesh remembered solemn,
Black as the sulk of basalt.
You will be the blood of red trillium
And false mermaid spilled in spring.
You will be the long tongues of moths
That drink from swamp orchids.
You will be stillness,
A whipstalk of grace,
The cruel gaze of silk,
The hot wink
Of a black-eyed pea,
The dumb, ponderous softness
Of a guava,
The grace of a mare.
Gluttonous, solitary larva,
You will eat the world.

- Natalie Kenvin