Volcano

Thirst has made a god of me, and you
my gift, my igneous bride. With goats

milk-dry and wheat hunched in dust,
the village will truss you in lapis beads

and swear you can seduce me into rain.
Without water, the only way to choke

a fire is another fierce enough to steal
its air. Salamandrine, I will return you

obsidian: a sharpened flint to light the fields
ablaze, a knife against their necks, a war.

"Volcano" first appeared in Spinning Jenny (Number 9).