How can i

Already you press so eagerly
against my skin.
How can i give you to the world?

How can i give you to the world?
This world is nothing gentle,
nothing kind
(but there are stars --)

How can i give you to the world?
To the hooked praise of kind strangers,
to our too-knowing darts --
(We will draw out your heart
in strings
and play cat's cradle):

but there are stars --

i will give you to the stars staring
to the smutface moon
to the thin lines of trees twigbare in January
and small frogs crying like crickets.

i will give you to the good, green grass
to the small heartbreaks of snails beneath your boots
to the uncurling of spring leaves, chartreuse, translucent,
tender, brave.

i will give you to the summer sky: unlined
and doorless blue
to the reek of lost birds' bones beside the path,
to the mindless trundling of beetles
sparking gembright in their mud and shit.

i will give you to your days
to their thousand sharptooth beauties
to their thousand thousand betrayals
small and deep.

i will give you to the misery
(the miracle)
of your small skin.
With my blood i will give you to the world
wrapped in your body
so thin a wall, so
permeable