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Bare, sleek against sheets, we exist in the break between sultry rain. The bite quick, like snake venom spreading through my limbs; the afterward, a dismembering of thoughts as the fever climbs each spinal curve into the reptilian self I call home. This  isn't love; I could kill. My need an addiction like morphine after amputation, like a tongue finding the socket almost closed, the incessant searching for the tooth. The crows come again listening for our breathing, leaning in, observant of the way I watch for the light. And the dogs know. No longer quiet beside me, they huddle in corners, try to bond with strangers. I am a stranger to the mirror, eyes dark underneath, skin glassine. I want the drug of you in me, the burn so close to need. We are being born and still born again. My love, you have taken from me the substance.
Colette Jonopulos
Asystole by Sherry Musick