For Rachel Mennies

I read your poem and believed
that you are also the axe
and the ice which reaches only for itself
and also the heartwood smooth and wet as a whetstone

I had been thinking about pine needles
and how like those soft fragrant quills I am
And how the axe can only split and give off
The scent of sap and the taste of fresh grass

After we stop touching
I notice the soft bed of needles
and the little drops of blood

smelling so like a split tree
that I reach into myself
​and in my mouth - the taste of metal


​

Adriane Seville is a Spanish-American poet living in Texas. He is married with two cats and a dog."