My blood, persistent as sugar, the slow spill
and collect of grains
why my sister says all the mosquitos
fill themselves at night.
I wake to fresh funeral mounds
on my legs
my blood dandelions the city
which is a field.
I pick up all the pieces, trace
the bloodline
through teashop and darkroom
come into the light
fingerless, unsure of what I have lost.
When I was a child,
I thought might actually be a butterfly.
I drank sugar water and waited to bloom.
Art by Usarae Gul