Synchóresi
         after Korina

You pull a weighted blanket
from storage and marvel
at the smell of who you were
the years you slept the scent
of your dreaming discharged
over and over turning.

Traces of toothpaste mastic
and dust. Garlic crushed
and stainless steel
slid between the pads
of your thumb and index finger
to pull what will come
inevitably from your pores
in the heat of another Athens
afternoon.

But it's the quiet part of night
and the films are playing
back to back black and white.
A heart you once knew
is beating worlds away
in worlds you can't hold 
beyond what you remember
misremember of them. 

What's left to study?
What is it that jolts you awake
after you've begun to drift
leaving you sometimes shelled 
by shock that our desires
make each of us tireless
animals?

Cats at the window
feral and insatiably hungry.
The scent of us gathered 
like desperate strangers clever 
in our waiting for a shutter
to ease open in a smoke-tinged 
breeze so we can sneak 
inside. 

Not to escape the wild fire.
We are the wild fire. 
And you—
You don't believe this
world this 
this
can be saved.

But I believe in you.
I believe in
the you that saves you.