your sunflower heart is fluttering against my eardrum, unsteady and unstable like a foxglove tincture, a turn signal just slightly out of sync with the taillight gleaming ahead of you in the darkness. beneath the mass of my skull, my brain, your breastbone is soft, malleable; if i could work it loose from your rubber-banded flesh, i could build a sandcastle with it, carve patterns of tiny bricks with the only nail i haven't bitten down to the quick, raw and ragged. your heart would rest, cradled safely between the two highest turrets of the fortress, with me as guard and portcullis and staff and doting family, adoring subjects.

my pulse pounds in my fingertips, transmitting morse code through the attenuate barrier of your skin, and your heart flutters back, dot dot dot dash dash dash dot dot dot, before falling silent, still. i draw back and press my lips against your clavicle, transmit the message to your eyelids, your lashes, before leaving you to sleep in peace.