Bullets and Butterflies

Will you see the heart in crimson and its torn and shattered edge
or recite the rosary piously and pray and blindly pledge
to expunge your soul, just one less species
of the flutter by butterflies that make you go to pieces
of the pretty ones with active tongues always probing for your nectar
finding ways to make you pay an homage to the scepter
stamen or stigma is the prisoner of war
the sentence, and the words that mean more than a butterfly whore
who is fickle in her feeding and deigns a future tryst
velvet gloved and fingers reaching in the shape of frenzied fist
feigning love in a bullet's jacket and the powder is desire
and the wings of jet black swallowtail never fail to inspire
a response, a retort, a secret blush and stroking
and a stoking of a fire that is starved for air and choking
on a premise, on a promise that a law will break tonight
and a feeling, infatuation, on the hook of a brand new height
for monarchs, migration, and drunk on monarchy
and on milkweed, and thistle, and Pennyroyal tea.