​A Rose, Not a Rose, by Stacy Grimes

​A Rose, Not a Rose
 
You wanted it to shine like a rose. Light
unfolding the labia of a rose, scent aroused 
by the sun. But out of the night ocean
it arose, male and female it arose, a vessel of salt blood.
 
Like a banshee keen, a salt-rimed
moon rose, a vale of shifting silver.
Red veined moon gaze, round white
scream, cracking the ice sheet into floes.

You wanted to wear it so thin. Sheer
across a liminal space, a see-through mist, a screen
to catch a fetch, a process continuous, a riddle
becoming blessed, rosy-lit, a windrowing web. 
 
On the foggy air, you sought to memorize by rote
the banshee’s song, the name of youth drowned
in the blood of the rose, the blood
on the forelock of the minotaur foretold
the sheeting of youth, the foreskin, the blood on the horn.
 
You wanted to sink your teeth into the moon. Blood 
of youth, pinking an ocean of foretellings. Thorn 
of youth, worn in a torn veil. Spider 
of youth, in her web the wept petals of the rose. Song
of youth, the wispy elocution of a retreating snake.
 
Into the deep it reposed. The youth of Song arose.
The petals wept, sheeting the lost intentions’ remains.
Echolocation of a rose: faint shame. Rain
streaking Baconesque over its black and infinite host.
 
The frozen night sea rose - the dragon’s egg, the candling breath: 
yolk golden, veins red, one maze of heart -
from it fetch.

Stacy Grimes

Stacy Grimes writes fiction, poetry and essays. Her fiction has been published in Five Points and anthologized in High 5ive: An Anthology of Fiction From Ten Years of Five Points. Her poetry has been published in Praxilla.