Over there, slow rain that hangs on the canals,

pools in the palm and in the birds

and then perches in the trees,

come back, come back, as it slides down the bark of my spine.

The mouth is diseased,

seizing and azure.

You think you know, love,

what my insides look like

because you have felt them,

when really you have drawn

the map of another woman

and traced it over my chest,

in order to hear the rhythms

of the wings and winds and pauses.