If I bored into your middle
and counted your rings,
my hands would just come out
bloody—

but that crooning pink stuff inside of you knows
more than I do.

When I dream, I dream of the texture of trees and
of your hands that smell like smoke and soil—

your hands that are softer now than they were when they held mine tightly
and guided me up your middle and flipped me over—
your hands that are weaker now than when they held me inert by the ankles
and placed my brown footprints on the kitchen ceiling.

I know you with my bones—
where you were once but are no longer.
There are no more ghosts who live between us,
my Methuselah.