The stories line my vaguely painted body

on bleak cigarette nights—

their inertia heavies my limbs;

I can't walk down the crooked lane.

They sing of fading emeralds and ruby eyes

at sleepless nights—

filled with cerulean depths;

A handwritten forge of gore and rage.

And they remain like that

until they survive the waves and auric cracks

of smiling afar and never moving back—

to where we belonged.