Unnaming
Mahtab Chaudhry
aug 2020
after “Lilith and Eve” by Yuri Klapouh Let us turn now towards some gentle reckoning wherein we may suffer love and rewrite that which was unwritten: stained and weeping ichor, my lungs beating holey wings, heart beating I am not holy I am not holy I am not holy. This too is an unmarked grave. And before, lounging spiteful and true draped across your legs, a spitfire but no less tender for it. As if we could remain stones unturned. As if singular devotion ever goes unpunished. I wonder now if you were taken from my rib. You must have been, or I from yours — And God damn it, I want back inside of you. To nestle right between your spine-bones and bloom something brutal. I’ve never been the type to beg but to get back up to you I’d crawl and spit blood, a mad thing. I’ll move heaven. Failing that, I’ll raise hell. They say I left, willful and proud. This is a lie, of course. I fell screaming your name.