Talia lit

Talia lit
a candied wick,
her annual try
to melt away
the cherry-glazed
sadness,

but having
no taste for cake
and no fondness
for pie, she drips pink-
blue stings on her
waiting

palm, its cracks
brimming with waxy
rivers, to set
a striped and flamed
believing, where
as when

the tremors
go out, she'll wish
for tears to rise
and curled smoke to close
the black eyes of
heaven

— Francis Scudellari