one who cant read one's muse

there’s a lady dressed in paper -
a tangle of ink and sheets and words -
and I’d think how much I wished to touch
the bare, blotched skin of her stained wrists,
black as coal, like the smudges on her cheekbones
or how her movement blended still
and calmed the tearing of her skirt.

I’d mend the mess she brought me for
while she clutched her bosom of Italian sonnets
and her italic collarbone in colorless prose.
a cruel collision of flesh and pride
where the soul sings in patches of paragraphs
and half-hearted stanzas leaked letters
in her lashes.

she sang in shades, and formed deep fonts
and told a story I couldn’t tell.
(I never did learn how to read)