Matchstick Box

My heart is a diamond 
matchstick box
full of lightning flowers
bright-blossom incendiary
petals
strike me and I
burst into bloom.

My heart is a 
moonpearl nautilus,
endless chambered spiral circle,
ancient siren song
embedded in ever-widening circles
cradled to your ear
it whispers a low tide
of hush-now lullaby.

My heart is a feathered
faraway bird
a phoenix rising
fierce and free
Burn me.
Blaze me.
Bury me in the ashes
and I rise
a wounded healer,
a trail of glory,
my tears the balm that soothes,
the medicine that mends,
the song that calls us home.

My heart is a Rose of Sharon,
opening, opening
a broken glass mosaic,
a fractured emerald bursting
into hummingbird wing,
a shattered door becoming
a ruin
a portal
a promise.

My heart is a pair of striped stockings
a cold sassy tree,
sarsaparilla sipped through
a long straw
a cotton candy carousel,
a Xanadu,
a Wonderland,
a magic carpet ride from
Amen to Abracadabra.

My heart is marzipan
and cinammon
a butter-brickle serenade
Zanzibar honeycomb
dripping poems
like paintings
like parasols
like parades
of painted ladies
wearing sunshine
in their skin.

My heart is a pair of
snake-skin boots
hot pink spike-heeled boots
Victorian lover silver-button boots,
worn-out, faded-in leather boots,
thigh-high, make-you-beg-for-it boots,
black vinyl say-it-like-you-mean-it boots,
steel-tipped-stompin’-round-the-block boots

My heart is a pair of
these-boots-were-made-for-walking boots
and they’re gonna walk all over
these sawdust blues.
Or dance.
Maybe the tango.