there is something nostalgic in every part of you
in your thighs beneath my childhood frame
the crook of your neck pressed against my nose
your voice throughout the walls—yellow, burgundy, blue

the dull thump of your heart crashing
through your chest—up your bones
to your shoulders to your neck and your skin
reaching up through your body into my small ear

your breathing was deep and meaningful
slow and done with purpose (everything you did
had purpose) and, as a child always clings to their mother,
i tried to match my own breath to yours

-f.j.e.

“   today i awoke in the sky.
swells of air (from my lungs
a ribbon of breath and mist)
billowing milky clouds floating

sunshine lapped in warm waves
at my azure-rimmed body (stretches
of skin bleached in heat raindrops
gather and break from my eyes)

an atmosphere shattered (crackled
burned at the force of my fingertips)
every edge of sun-fried frame strain
fingertips in another galaxy another plain

the world pushed me further out
(with a gentle kiss a rush of chill
stars pulled me closer) herded
with its rocky, sharp touch

spiral out of the cosmos (disentangle
my skin becomes galaxies my thoughts
become more) stars suns comets moons
veins of asteroids and hairline dust

planets woven from eyelashes (flesh rips
into cavernous black holes) my entire being
spread across an inky expanse and
today i am another universe   “

In the hearth of your tempestuous bluster,
there is love and there is anger.
You sweep my showers off the ground,
pull them into your own windswept skies.

My dewdrop deluge is gentle,
serene in the wake of your passionate precipitation.
Like mother nature paints orange the first leaf of fall,
tender watercolor touch, our seasons change together.

Your gale is merciful in its burn,
my raindrops burn against your touch.
You turn me into something wonderful,
I am no longer raindrops—I am liquid sunshine.

My dear, suns live their longest eons.
Each is smaller than your blazing moment.
A storm can burn for eons before the lightning strikes—
and the rain falls soft the entire time.

When you stir and leave, I am still here.
Droplets lonely on blades of grass, I wait for you.
Even your timelessness is not timeless enough—
I miss the simmer of your ardor-flushed inferno.

In time there is growth and comfort.
my own rainstorms brew softer than yours,
but there is love in the fingertips of time,
and nobody—not even you—has such gentle hands.

“   in the corners of the pockets of
a no one’s earth (a planet pumped
full of empty purpose) grass pokes and
scratches legs and brushes fingertips

crawl deeper into my skin its reeds
leave not a stalk or a root untouched
(burrow in foothills of mountains
skin and senses and lingering heat)

breath becomes air (then stitches
itself, latches to another breath)
our eyes become planets become eyes
lose sight briefly to the gaze of another

let your hair tangle in the wisps
of my own (my leaves are all yours
each tiny, feeble stem i’ve grown)
our roots tangle legs tangle breaths tangle

retreat into the clay (two heartbeats
in the soil sharing seed and marrow)
you and me and me and you
the someones in a no one’s planet   “

In your warm grasp, I shiver,
wet eyes across my skin, burning gaze,
turned to liquid in your passion-clad embrace.

Caress my flesh gently, my love,
my skin is fragile against your inferno--
your cheeks are coral-flushed and peach.

Legs clasped by tangled sheets, knees bruised and knobby,
they clatter and creak, augment my vulnerability,
your breath is sweet and welcoming. I breathe.

Your lips are chapped and precious,
in their rosy, saccharine spread,
my own quiver in their intensity.

Don’t love me too hard, my porcelain dear,
my plains stretch long and ador-flushed.
They ache for you and your cooling touch.