I can barely take my eyes off you
long enough to write you a poem
for fear you could vanish
when I look away
in the time it takes to
find a blank page
you could dematerialize
decide to take a walk
forget to come back
fall asleelp
not wake up

it might be a mania of mine
I see you are still here

I tell you I love you
you say it back
or not
depending
but you do

I don’t doubt you
I don’t doubt me
but how can I not hear
the hauting quiet
after you’re gone
even while you are
still here?

that deafening silence that lasts for years

you’re a slippery fish
my piscis
but I know
what you won’t say
that I am your safe cave

I’ve watched you look for me
in crowded places
and your face
when you find me
is worth of a poem

this morning
is your morning
pick up your bed
and walk

the old is gone
the new is
still in its cocoon

pick up your bed
pick up your heart
kick up your heals
and run

I turned around and there you were
walking across the reef toward me,
remember that?
I couldn’t believe my eyes

what sense guided you directly to me
in the dusk?

we sat here
as the tide turned
and came closer
you smiled at how surprised
I was but
you could always find me
even in the dark.
I put my new sunglasses on the rock beside me
and forgot them
they’ll wash up somewhere
someday.
maybe you will find them

I come here a lot now
to this spot
with the secret bench
on the sea side of
the rocky point
you can barely see from the sand

later, we picked our way back
across the reef without falling
gingerly as cats
in the moonless dark
you’d think it couldn’t be done but
you and I have senses
other people don’t

hold present
our palms pressed together
our tender places
life lines locked
in a web of
tiny finger bones

hold present
the milky way
arched above us
our galaxies of capillaries
intertwined
as close as a
breath of skin

catch me
in the fish trap
i offer my flesh
for your feast

in this way
i become you
i knit my body
into your bones

in 1000 years
we will be together
still
in single grains of sand

*some hunting cultures suggest that prey voluntarily yields to the hunter as part of the circle of life—a rarely-recognized form of love

PREY / PRESA

pésqueme
en la trampa para peces
ofrezco mi carne
para saciar tu hambre

de este modo
me convierto en tí
tejo mi cuerpo
dentro de tus huesos

en mil años
estarémos juntos
todavía
en granitos de arena

*algunas culturas de caza sugieren que la presa cede por voluntad propia al cazador como parte del ciclo de la vida–una forma poco reconocido del amor