Hothouse

By Julianna Riccioli

give me plum-colored fingerprints 

i can wear around my waist 

like an unholy halo of adoration 

or, i am Saturn, with my own rings 

because there is no love 

so divine 

as ours. 

in the hazy hours after midnight 

as we bask in our shared sticky-satiation 

i pray this heaven 

(our heaven)

lasts forever. 

your love is moonlight 

that never wanes. 

i will glimmer 

(only for you)

and wish 

on silver streaks of shooting stars 

for more nights like these. 

“dear celestial body, 

(one apart from you or me)

 

i worship [you] at the altar of our affection, 

my supernova, 

and ask that this heaven is not some one-off 

and we continue to have more than the fuzzy nighttime before the dawn and you always revere me. 

humbly, 

[me].” 

so

while we’re here 

(or anywhere) 

in the light of the streetlamps sneaking in through the crack of the curtains i leave you love-bites 

like asteroids 

colliding on your neck 

you read me collections by Neruda

like they are our sacred texts 

the words jumping in the dim of the dark 

and we feel silly and lovely 

and we can exist 

in our own paradise 

together.