There were bay leaves the size of ocean liners. I was inside the spots of a giraffe, but then a girl stole my colors and I became various arbitrarily chosen birds. One of them is passing you as you read, now. In the music there was a quiet thunder that I recognized as her kiss. The killing bliss that would rip the quiet coverlet from my eyes and set the world to the counting of graves. And I will be their stones, and I will read you as you read me. From the dead. From the roots of their teeth, before they rose from human mothers. There were bay leaves the size of pinheads. There were animals and storms. A way to steal the color. A way to bide the forms.