yellow skirt of mourning doves

when you called, you were just a little too breezy: did i want your yellow skirt? you know, the one that twirled around your knees to flirt just shy of happiness?

you’ve been brittle on the edges of your noncommittal answers to your future, and i was alert to your willful loss of delight. our friends all assert that hoofbeats aren’t zebras for my acquittal of the crime of your stifling loneliness. they cannot figure out why you gave up.

(i know) because the acrimonious weight of your yellow skirt is a foxglove punishment for me--you were only just beyond my reach. my skirt has mourning doves;