The lightness of paper

soft enough to crumble

to a chirping palm ball

released into the air,

an imagined perfect pitch,

too gossamer to float

to its ultimate arch,

unfolding in the web

of alluring sunshine

aspiring to be

in its unfolding angles

a thread of silk

caught into the patterns

of a spun handkerchief,

flapping finely down to dirt,

flagging to human desires,

a reverse puff tucked black

into a left back corner pocket.

In its extending it is

virgin wood pulp

culled and hewn

from rings of fine pine,

rising in its descent

to barely glimpsed evolving

beaks, talons, feathers

caught in the spider’s web

and shook down by thundering axe.

Flagging or the handkerchief code (also known as the hanky code, the bandana code,) is a color-coded system, employed usually among the gay male casual-sex seekers or BDSM practitioners in the United States, Canada, Australia and Europe, to indicate preferred sexual fetishes, what kind of sex they are seeking, and whether they are a top/dominant or bottom/submissive.

If you wore your hanky in your left pocket, you were deemed as more submissive, or a “bottom,” whereas the right pocket meant that you were a “top” or more dominant. A black handkerchief meant that you were into S&M- sadomasochism.

Reverse puff refers to a type of handkerchief pocket fold where the puff or pointed ends fold out like the petals of a flower.