For my birthday

Tripping happily into 26 with sun on her back and breeze to her skin, she collapsed in sunbeams someplace time, stretching endlessly outward, felt restful, warm and sweet.

Deep breaths in pulled at pale skin between ribs, like an oyster offering a pearl, and she swept cleanly from her breast a deep, feverish shame.

Then, parting lips just enough, air rushes in like a hungry current filling the remaining space with nector, light, and a beautiful kind of indifference to the absolute inevitability of it all.