Building a butterfly garden with you
I want to steal armfuls of chicory, speckled with parasols of Queen Ann’s lace from the roadside with you, but we should wait until night// Be crimes, do gay you say. Crimes of beauty. Gay as in don’t forget to kiss me before you leave for work// I say It’s a toll, a tax, it’s necessary// throw the shovel in the trunk. Lay down some plastic so we don’t get soil in the Camry’s upholstery. Let’s move these living bodies. Let’s dig in the dirt under the shifting shadows of a new moon. Let’s steal our own monarch sky.
Queer, as in
the mountain sunrise seeping through the coyote fence at the foot of the snow wrapped & sparkling Jemez mountains// holding hands at Ghost Ranch, thinking about brush stroke flowers & dead queers in love in the desert// smoking weed with your mother under endless, cold stars, our breath corporeal in the night air.
the golden hour in September, which is really like 15 minutes, on the back deck of our house (a very very very fine house) with our dogs (two very very very fine dogs) just sitting in peace as the slatted sun melts into the pots of basil and lavender and mint, until the she finally blushes and flees.
an old growth forest, creaking oaks and in August, thick with ticks// in August, your sweaty palm pressed against mine as we hike this dry creek// that fall, a friend processed the acorns for butter.
sprouting seeds in the 2×4 raised garden bed frame you built in the garage: the broccoli, the curling tendrils of squash, the astringent sticky stems of cherry tomatoes we planted in our first together garden. You said you never liked maters before ours.
a flooded creek rushing the autumn bridge over Dripping Springs, where we dangled our naked toes and missed Pam together// Or Lick Creek Lake, where we waded in, together, and you pointed out that stout green heron relishing the mud bank. I didn’t even know about green herons until you.
Kit Steitz is a disabled, queer, non-binary poet, and the founder of Pink Poetry Club on Bluesky, or they could be a pothos named Pathos, there’s really no way to tell. They enjoy writing poems while fending off slobbering, overgrown puppies and geriatric cats. Their work has appeared in Moist Poetry Journal, the lickity~split, ALOCASIA, like a field, Roi Fainéant Press, and others. You can find their neurospicy-fueled ramblings at @kitikins.bsky.social.