POEM

On the night you read my cards, 

you told me the spiraling moth

was my dead grandfather but you did not 

tell me we’d be lovers, had been lovers 

since the first sound waves collided 

on the ocean floor. 

Now I know why I felt like crying

when you traced the lines across my palm.

Why you looked away when the fire hissed.

If you’d kissed me, I would have kissed back. 

When I left the dead moth for you 

in the morning, paper wings outstretched

like a faerie scroll across the Three of Swords, 

I did not know I was seeing my future, 

spiraling toward your light until the end.

          — Ashley Walshe