Before the rain falls,
the leaves turn their pale bellies 
skyward, playfully.
She is staring at the sky.
He thinks *I should kiss her now.

Towel clutched loosely
warm, blushing skin, damp with steam
cool condensation
distillation of lust, his
fingers wrapped in her wet hair.

Because inventing heaven
from pebble and mist
was backbreaking,
heartquaking
work

and
because I
shivered with 
fever, my body lit
by rapture unfathomed,

I sought stillness in the mouth
of the ocean, gave myself
to her shallows and,
with sleepy eyes, 
said

Leave 
me here.
You laid hands to my 
dreaming curves. They became 
dunes, shifting; you filled my sky with birds.

When the word over finally made sense,
I shook you from me
like water,

like sleep.

it makes the break soft, uneven. 
even if I could, i wouldn't—
what?
Sink firmly in until I could speak for you?
Say lovely things 
about what it was like?

Even then I would **** it.
Or at least watch it die; 
dispatch a small flock of birds
to make it seem
cherished.

Think, small heart.

Don't say
sad eyes know things.

Don't say
hurt things make poems.

I raised you wrong,
told you lies to console you.
Now you speak in five cent fortunes.

Now you don't know anything.

You say
finish it

like  I have fallen upon you
a moonlit mercenary
eyes bright in the dangerous night

to find you sleeping,
unguarded;

like you opened your eyes
to an almost kiss

as I lowered myself for the ****;

like I would sink,
blade deep—
close enough, 
finally;

like I wouldn't love you still.