Flowers From a Book

Opening up my notebook

with your flowers inside,

beautiful, like you, colours

and complexity catching

the eyes, the grass stem you

used to tie them in the countryside

outside Moscow last summer.

They’re a ready-made memory,

which is probably why you gave them

to me, as you gave me your pristine body,

satin skin, eyes wide open in orgasm,

burying your head in the bed sheets,

as those flowers would now be buried

in winter, instead preserved in paper.

And these words preserve you, pale

Blue eyes smiling back at me from my

inked letters on the white page, questioning

as always, and full of confusion at

the meaning of my language, the barrier

which finally finished us, cut short pleasure

suddenly, like a slowly ticking detonator.