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No, you laughed like sugar stirring,
your feet are too black,
your teeth are so sharp!
Can you not stand up straight
in my old dresses?
Can you not make your flesh
like mine?
Shamed, fur flamed across my cheek,
but you patted it pale with flour and sweet,
and I wept to be savage and bristle-stiff
in such a tidy place,
in such silent, clean arms.
I slept curled
at the foot of your bed,
reeking of lavender and lilac
though I spied no purple field.
I growled at moths that plagued your hair
and woke with every stairwell creak.
But you brushed back my pelt
with lullabies,
into a long braid that fell
across pillows like shoulder blades.
You showed me the word kitsune
in a book with a long ribbonmark
like blood spilled on the print—
I chewed the page and swallowed it,
and learned there only that
crawling into your arms,
embarrassed by my heat, my wet nose,
