Candles, Olivia Cameron

Candles

snuffed out

God created women by striking a match.

women are dancing flames; their bodies wicks, dripping with sweat, smelling of vanilla and cedar.

men stick out their noses, taking a sniff and licking their lips.

they praise the scent, like the way it makes them hungry, starving. they stick their fingers out, poking at the heat.

oh how they flinch, when they feel the burn.

they yell that they hate vanilla and cedar and the way flames pirouette around their thighs as hot wax drips off their hand.

they snuff out the fire God started. Olivia Cameron

bite me, i’m burning

that girl is a candle. i’m addicted to the smell, sharp sugary sex... i light her up, watch her burn! she undulates in the marigold like the witches of old. her wax starts to melt into that sticky, fragrant liquid. i feel it on my fingers, skin burning with her scent... quickly blow her out! the candle in front of me, the wick and white, slick inside reminded me of the apple core that eve left behind. adam kissed the juice off her lips, I would have taken a bite!

Am I on Fire?

I don’t always feel like a person.

A planet in space, a cloud in the sky, a head without a body.

Why did God make us? Why do we have minds, hearts, bodies? We can’t truly share any of it.

I can’t let you crawl in, even when I open up on a page.

You’re just reading.

You can’t feel me. And sometimes I can’t feel me, either. my heart beats and breath flows, but my skin doesn’t tingle with vitality.

Sometimes I feel so alone that I need to burn.

I’ll stick my finger as close as I can to the flame of a candle.

To be that close to burning,

When someone has to fix me, when someone has to kiss my charred skin, and blow out the flame I know I am loved.

I’m supposed to let God fill up the emptiness to know I’m real because he made me so.

I can’t hear his voice.

But I can feel flames.