all my dreams are butterflies and their wings

waxy, raw, and delicate 

“I’ll be careful” you assured me

but with sticky, probing fingers lurking so close to my heart

pulling and tugging the strings so tenderly with one hand

just so I lingered close enough 

and in the other, holding out a shimmering platter of decadent, discreet compliments. 

but 

when I reached to take what I thought was mine

you snatched them away,

let them go. one by one 

right before my glassy, drooling eyes 

each fluttering away on the breeze given power by your breath and your words

now they bloom in some faraway garden: ripe and blistering with nectar 

and I 

now washed up and wings stuck 

I am not to fly