Titanium

Cold and metalline, the soul was mined from rocks, became
               thin wire that keeps the colors in this enameled jewel from
bleeding. The soul remembers old pacts, yields to the demands of all
     lifetimes, sways in the style of windblown lindens and other
greens. Hammered, the soul is a container: yellow watering
                can that pours a body into the base of a lime tree at the hour

of death. My soul looks like a lock of red hair bound by purple
               thread. Marine-scented, my soul is contained: Atlantic sand
inside an hourglass. But somebody holds a portion of it. He
       is an oyster enclosing one grain. My soul tastes like a lilac
branch rubbing against the rusty corrugated shed on a humid
             day. And so I shake when he gets off the train. Sharp, the soul

is an iron fence of fleurs-de-lis where a passerby puts a baby’s
               lost cotton sock. It is there in the pink lipstick-stained cigarette
smashed on the sidewalk, rolled white paper embellished with
        one blue stripe. The soul is engineered, an eternal car moving
ancient attachments across eons. Cold and metalline, the soul
                was mined from rocks, a silver durability that began in a star.

Originally published in New England Review (Volume 44.1). Copyright © 2022 by Rose DeMaris. Reprinted with the permission of the author.