I’m dark-eyed and formless,
crossing country- a bullet train,
At times I think 
I have run enough 
and yet every time 
my racing, timid heart
sounds like an alarm
from the wild marshlands, 
the tall meadow grass, 
the tree that holds me like a daughter 
against its splintering bark. 
I’m crying fairy dust 
as I travel knee deep in mud and ivy.
From the corners of my eyes:
a pale shine on 
skin and plant matter. 
I hold the waking sun on my back, 
racing her to the edge of the mountain 
where the light hits last. 
I’m shaking
shaking off reins and blinds that hold me silent,
shaking in the body of a little girl, controlled by fear, 
shaking in the mouth of a child 
who doesn’t know how to say no. 
I clatter around the attic of her throat, 
trying to make enough noise so that 
she will hear my plea- but it’s too late 
for me 
and I know she can only hear my florals, 
not my thunder. 
        I wake with my heels in the sand, 
buried once-over with every wave that crawls up 
        my horizontal body. 
        Body like a moon on the edge of universe, 
rotating softly like a dancer-
        bound to never cease moving. 
I lie 
eyes open like water droplets 
on a beach I visited once and never left,
the ocean water- forming a wall 
between me and him.
No. I see it’s not a wall but instead a bridge- 
to a place only I can go,
that calls my name like honey across 
yarrow and goldenrod.
A map- written on my body, 
which I mistook 
for stars.