Soundtrack

Katrina Kaye

You prefer to listen to my soundtrack:

my sigh at your touch,
the chords of gasp curse moan prayer,
the rhythm of my laughter.

The pulse of your lips on bare shoulder
sends a harmony throughout my body.

I continue to interlace my notes with yours,
eager to wrap my coda around you,
hold you tight inside this melody of morning.

I purr for you,
a vibration between skin and bone.
The treble of your embrace hums
inside the length of my octave.

It’s a tempo in my shoulder blades,
the meter in a Monday morning
and a half night’s sleep,
residing in the throat of me.

I hold my song still,
take my heart off my tongue
and put it in the drawer by my bed.

The cadence of our time together
is still rattling against exposed skin,
though your lips sing static.

You embedded a beat inside me
and left your refrain to reverberate
between spine and sternum,
long after the music died.

“Soundtrack” is previously published in They Don’t Make Memories like that Anymore (2011).

When We Were Dying

Katrina Kaye

We pay little attention
to the throbs as the
strychnine clenches backbones,

leaving us partially immobile
in the pain of descent.
The three of us lay in a triad,

trying to see faces in the sky.
Only a few hours ago,
the stars had so much

to say, but now they sit,
shimmering silently.
We are dirty and exhausted.

Our bodies expelling
poison through pores
opening up to the dawn.

But, somehow, we don’t
feel as alive as we did
when we were dying.

“When We Were Dying” is previously published in Leonardo Literary Magazine (2005).

Katrina Kaye

The rhythm
of your words
tapping against
closed eyelids
give me peace.

It is fleeting.

Only long
enough for me
to slip into sleep
and wrap myself
in comfort.

It is enough.

“Read to me” is previously published in New Mexico 43nd Annual Conference on Aging 2021 Poetry Competition (2021).