Lili Raynaud

ghazal in anticipation

By: Lili Raynaud

Year: 2023

drink every last drop. don’t wait for satiation. wait
for the truth to swallow you whole. wait—

teeter on the edge of that great precipice, dance on the knifeblade
of the truth we call “love”. wait

for the storm, the place lightning strikes ground
the metallic taste it leaves in your mouth, lying in wait

in the tall grass. dig your fingers into the soil, try to remember
how it felt the first time someone tugged at your arteries. but wait,

don’t just do something. stand there. stand as it glimmers and dims
as it waxes and wanes each and every year we wait

for it, the harvest moon, til orange beams shoot from our fingertips
the night’s in full bloom, tangerines stinging cracked lips– wait!

hear that?
the crack of thunder, the raindrops, their weight

you pick the rinds from under your nails. you whisper fairydust
you remember when the forest was nothing but the promise of shelter, a place to wait

for the storm to wash over, for the wave to whirl you clean
earth & spleen, why won’t you wait

just a couplet more. just one more. let a flower be just that, a flower.
yank the stem, let the sap stain your hands.