Handle With Care

consider how many of your poems

start with love, come lie here

with me, love, please come to me.

consider the possibility that

you are touch-starved, 

that you’re longing for something

your bones barely know anymore,

but maybe they did before.

consider your fear, how on 

nights like these, you curl 

into blankets like a shield 

and think maybe i’m hungry

for something i’ll never taste.

consider yourself, waiting 

for that itch under 

your skin to disappear,

the last whisper you hear

before you drift to sleep.

consider: you, happy,

a prospect you hardly dare

think of.