amaranth 

stuck in your song teeth,
we invented red with our necks.
i watched the pearls shrink
in my mouth like throat lozenges. 
the summer did not
hold us like we hoped it would.
a porch light turned into a ship.
i sailed as far away from language
as i could. when i don't wake up in time
i pretend i am a toad in the wet 
soft earth surviving winter.
i call my father & leave a message.
he does not call me back. the jevoha's witnesses
send us recruitment letters 
& i whisper to the paper 
until they become birds.
every deserves a chance at the elsewhere.
i love shirking my duties. i love 
the rare moments when i am
not a tool of some monster machine.
when i bead a plant & the plant talks
about how she stumbled upon her color. 
the amaranth grows in my sleep world.
i wake up counting seeds, messing up
& starting again. they are even smaller than
a mustard seed. i dream of horses
fitting inside the grain. i see my reflection
the size of a blink. the size of short breath.
i give up on counting & just start
filling the bath with the tiny seeds.
on the skin they feel like snakes rolled
into pockets of night. i have never known
the sky to stay put. i have a friend
who is three feet in the spirit world.
they call me & tell me their house burned down
& i believe them. who will believe us?
ask them if they have spoken yet
to the plants in their yard. they realize
they have not. not for a long time.
sage & yarrow. they are alright for now
just like i am alright for now. for now.
the amaranth makes a promise that one day
i will be as small as one of the seeds.
relief floods my bones. i spend the rest
of the night sleep-walking in the garden.
when the plants die, they always sing.