In the distance between the fruit
          & the serpent, there was desire.

All I was was merely a bridge.
          I knew God, not just as light,

but as the hollow from which
          light proceeds. I knew Adam.

Once, we plucked a red thing
          & called it Tulip. We’d sing

with the lyrebirds, then make
          love on the meadow. When

he splayed my body open–
          like groundwater– & reached

inward to drink from me, it was
          the closest I came to playing

God. & we were content:
          touching ourselves, naming

things, awaking day after day
          to find the prohibited fruit, like

two wild dogs strapped to meat.
          But the one time I failed is all you

recall. Tell me, what am I in
          the stories you learned: Greedy

or keen? Treacherous girl? Is there
          even one account where I do not

chew the fruit without protest?
          Eternity is hardly an accurate

measure of life. To live forever
          is to die at once. But I wanted

the thrill of something more,
          the way any bird, however fed,

looks towards the sky & wonders when.