sweating

it out.
of you,
this germ.
small and lightweight, craving blood
and a warm lap through your veins,
slipping past the tiny bones in your ear
to make war with your liver,
your spine and all that matters,
to set your blood on fire,
in the way that so many small things can
set fires in fields
or on rooves of houses,

set screaming faces flying at camera lenses,
set worlds wreaking,
smoky and steaming,
like the air above a pot of rice.