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THE RUMI IN YOU

feels a thin cut

while shaving your chin

and mishears

the jagged tune

of falling petals 

reining in whispers.

You whirl to avoid

the nay revealed

in your name—

a flute of grief

flooding the floor.

What other rocky faults

separate you

from Shams

in the dialect of rain?

When the Harvest moon

was last ringed by clouds,

did you lavender

your deepest bruise,

or did you whisker 

your weak chin as if

your own ruined beauty 

wasn’t a wearable thing?

And what fluted wound

could ruin love

more than the erosion

of running water?

Must a rusting of faith 

suggest why that i

so central to faith 

quietly ran—a letter 

left out in the rain?

Amidst the reign

of lavender & lingering

something in you

says “petrichor”

to feel the essence 

of stone in the mouth.

If you fail to whisk 

a thicker roux

from a flour’s dusty sorrow—

do your cuts, bruises or beard 

begin to masquerade 

as masculinity?

The Rumi in you asks

if they dare

to dissolve or

do they return 

to whisper

how to be a lover

of the rasp of rain, 

or why to be a lover

of the rasp of ruin?