In my darkness, where I will not look,
live the parts of me I do not wish to know.
I sense their vague shapes along the edges
shifting toward the trees as the flames flicker.
Sometimes during the day, I can hear them—
their mutters rising thick below my words,
like smoke billows from a chemical fire
fixing its pungent smell across a clear sky.
Mostly, they sleep like bears hibernating
deeply beneath the snow. I let them be.
Better left with violent dreams of salmon,
than cracking open the bones of the dead.
Better chained in soft recriminations,
than eviscerated with what I am.
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