Cold Sweat - Matthew Chi

Somehow, I find myself running
again & again I am told that nothing

follows & even then I am cold &
a boy. Still, my footsteps draw a

scarecrow in the sand. Sand so cold I
forget it’s sand so I look & look again

feeling like ash

—& it’s as if suddenly I am new & not
my shadow, but my last body is a pool

of not-light & still, I lighten and lighten
until there’s nothing left. What then

you say—then I take a lamp to the night
& set the desert afire, the whole fucking world afire

& in so much glass I see myself.