Harry Styles at the Met Gala

after sam sax

There’s a new century & he’s lace.
I won’t apologize.

*

I imagine wearing something like this to my wedding.

Or wedding someone wearing this.

Roses in the veil. What would my mother say about that.

*

At least if the boy in the photograph looked anything like you I could say I had a reason. I could say

he reminds me of you.
You remind me of you.

To think there was a time before I could no longer tell the difference.

*

Black rose on your arm, years black on either side of you.

Is there a way to say the light was pink or was it the floor.

The roses.

The years.

Gold as a frame, what he would hang from his ears if I asked.

If I asked.

*

The day behind the basketball court when [ ] called me what he called me.

The year behind his house, his mother’s roses downhearted in the heat.

*

On my knees in the new dirt, his car parked in the lot I turned my back towards.

If I lie to myself about this enough
it will, a century from now, be true.

*

There are no more other paradises.

*

The most I’ll-prove-it thing about me is that I’m not sure.

Is, like.

Look, look at.

That you could look at him & say yes, like that.

Mulch, lake-at-night, steam.

A photograph & a photograph.

That you can see his tattoos through the fabric.

Once a man opened my mouth & still, somewhere, still.

*

The kind of girl I could be
if someone had told me I could be a girl.
Almost one half of a scar from now.

Almost.

*

God moves on the water like God on water.

Blink twice. Come closer. We are so with

& without precedence. A wrinkle. A tear.

This eye-bright split in the white fabric between us.

*

Bone corsage. Sheer black swan
& a wingspan.

King of I snuck out of the house for him.
The mood rings mood irrespective of gender.

Let the new century in. Rose.

Slick. Saint. Saint. Saint. Saint.

*

I pull a sickle from the lake & curve it back.

A gown from now. A gown ago.

*

Black sleeves. Black carpet.

Backless woman and an earring.

Take the sheet off the mirror.

I won’t apologize.

*

If death could wife me let me look like this.

Let me look like everyone we’ve ever wanted to die for.