KS Culbreth

Spreading Dodder

Those long hours
alone with only idle airs
lung-pressed through
unadored lips that kiss
a glass rim
between yellowed fingertips

become droning days
silenced by the same closed doors
pipe-dream slammed
pried by a slim whispered
sorry and new vow
a promise patience forgives

become another summer
whose blooms wilt, weak stemmed
whose dodder spreads
a parasitic root
whose lips steal kisses
from the clover that it rots.