You are heat seeker

boy

with snuffing lips moth-drawn to flames,

Soot eater,

Try to bury yourself in warmth but succeed only

in swallowing all heat

and light.

You want the sun in this skin,

this unbearable light to bend to breath,

your extinguished breath

absorbing all

You forget

the sea is lined with ash,

this bright that crumbles bone

to dust.

Your parched throat mistook me for kindling

But what good is flame to a hearth

filled only

with ashes.