you breathe, you breathe,

your precious prize is life so not

can you go on, and on, and on and breathe,

when she and i and all the ones

you've loved one by one against your

paper pressed one by one,

you promised every one of us i

know precious, precious hair and

eyes and twisting hips on paper

in your callous ink, you swore

you loved us one by one.

your breathing still, and you

press those breaths like us one by

one, into your machine and i

am not as beautiful as the one (by one,

by one, by one, by one, by one, by one)

you loved into your leather book

in my turn your pen sketched

a face that loved you (all at once

and only you) and now i think

how beautiful it really is that you

in flowing lines struck one by one

are the last one of us

pressed on that last paper by one

of the ones you loved one by one

and though we are black on black on

white and unfortunately bare against

the fading, stinking brown of your own veins

it was one of us opened your veins and dipped your pen

that one of one of one of us few ones

that one who was not ready

to be loved only as long as

you drew that one her.

an hour? a day? she keeps you on that page,

you loved us but she has your book