I have known longing
like orange blossoms on frail branches,
Irish coasts and tall grasses,
pale sand on cold beaches,
Orlando with their long hair and wistful romances,
whose flat chest is hard against my head
with bones that dip and rise, rippling like wicker.
In each body lies a lifetime of learning
these are the hands that love me.
I’ve never felt guilty for being a servant of time,
but now I know how it can be subverted.
All that is good remains too temporarily.
But I still want you,
and all the ways your soul is swept away by the weather,
vivacious and undoubtedly held together with fretless thread.
Take me as I am
or cast me to the winds,
you say through platinum strands woven over your mouth.
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Jane DeLashmutt is a lesbian poet who calls Maryland’s Eastern Shore home. She is a 2025 graduate from the University of Maryland with a B.A. in English with a focus on Media Studies. Her work has been published in The Beacon and Stylus.
