Excerpt from

 

Ashes

 

From heaven, I watched her,
‘though my eyes were still aflame,
and my ribs were still blue.
They didn’t win, I whispered, as her arms built my wings.
They didn’t win.
Look at that moon.
It is a pebble in my hand
Tonight, I could skip it across that fog-drunk sea
to the lashes accordion in the night
and all they know of hate
is that it couldn’t beat the love out of me…

​

--Andrea Gibson