Where have I been all this time?

And what phoenix rose from the ashes?

Plasma ballpoint ink leaves streaks on my arm when that touch/sound barrier breaks,

when fingertips brush past. Bottled understanding with feather quills waiting, dipped. 

Skin on skin, detached from what it means to be so close to another. Yet here I write.

Atoms between us, miniscule distance but ultimately not close enough,

not centered enough within the microscopic ecosystem of you. Serene… in awe of its terrifying existence.

I’ll jump right in carelessly, holding fear with the ring of intimacy floating me to the surface. 

I’ve drowned before but I’ll do it again. But this time I think I am too close, dangerously- bubbling up to the surface, cool foamy dysregulation.

This time I think I’m exploding. 

I am torched. Staked in the desert, flesh melting off the igneous skeleton.

Unbearable, sweltering, flame.

Exposed exoskeleton, burnt tissues clenched and unclenched, in place of fear and utter excruciation.

Curdled blood clots falling out of the butchered, ashy veins, I am tied with tetanus, unwilling to exit myself, I am brutal carnage. 

All that is around me is currently productive. Creating while destroying. I sit in the middle, pushing, aching against me.

I am a taught bedsheet, quarters being flung against the ceiling. I am a bowling alley, bowling balls being thrown at the floor. 

I am flying, freely metallic, sucking on pennies before the breath and after the exhale. The body and soul are now fully connected, the mind and body are now finally free, 

Then I die.

An empty vessel left with the soul. 

Here we are together, where you have been this entire time, waiting, wanting. 

Delusional in death, yet you kiss the charred lips, cold, but reminiscent of the heat still holding.

You hold the trigger finger hanging to the body by a thread, and you gently caress against the flaky-skinned, bloody amber left to simmer.

A disgusting mess of burn victim unit guts and gore.

A hospital morgue left after multiple autopsies.

Author's Note

Looking to make this poem more solid, would like to professional opinions.