We fall to our knees during the shower of stars,
embracing underneath an umbrella of cloned cloaks.
She prays to stay young, to lay in a casket made of canvas.
Gilded wishes whisper against her skin,
and she is not afraid of the drops
that trap her in the void between Here and There.
My eyes are fixed on her, as immobile as the field
beneath our bent legs:
a bouquet of painted petals,
pale against the flushed
sunrise on her cheeks.
The god’s hand looms
inches from her face.
She is art that he creates with his paintbrush—
a scythe that turns her into a moon flower
before the dark coaxes it awake: still,
breathing, but never to hear midnight’s toll.
I pray for his mercy,
and he sketches my lips against her cheek.
A final swirl of the god’s magic kills
the love we had and immortalizes the beauty she craved.
But, at last, I can rest with our eternal kiss.