We counted stars swallowed
by nocturnal blue.
The light transcended fog,
an evening within which
hearts could get lost.
There, we made an abstraction
of all that our lives had meant
before that blinking second.
The calculus of the heavens
threatened defeat, but we cursed
and those doubting flames
retreated within the rigid darkness.
The muses singed our fingertips,
but we licked away the ash
and painted the other's breast red,
lovers tattooing art upon temples
of flesh.
