When I Should Be Asleep
I’m thinking of death/ of watching you cut dough lattices and weave them on top of a pie/ of death/ of kissing you inside a hollowed-out tree/ of death/ of the infinitesimal crackling of the coppery hairs on your thighs/ of death/ of smelling your neck/ of death/ of looking into the face of a pond with you/ of death/ of crawling beneath a sheet hot with your nakedness/ of death/ of your fingertip tracing the line of my profile/ of death/ of death/ of death/ of how not to grieve/ that you and I will not always/ be alive/ at the same time.
Francesca Leader is a writer originally from Western Montana. Her poetry and CNF have been published in Hooligan, Club Plum, Identity Theory, Sho Poetry, Door is a Jar, Stanchion, Literary Mama, Poetry New Zealand, and elsewhere. Her debut poetry chapbook, “Like Wine or Like Pain,” is available from Bottlecap Press.