I ask—I know,

but did I? pull you close only
only
to keep from flying away?

I once knew I cupped your head,
like water, to my lips.

I think I know now, hauntingly,
I might have wrenched your face to mine
like a ravenous and terrified animal
and kept on your lips but to seal my mouth,
a stormy vacuum,
that ****** ceaselessly the breath of too much
                  in the attempt to inhale one.

****** dry, it became nothing.

Still, it could not be helped.
Meaning would be given to the thoughtless
and its name—passion—would be answered,
its sweet breath ****** on.
But I
I never breathed anything.
And yet there was more sustaining my life.
What sweet did I taste? Its breath or
the more?

You would rename it—silly—to yourself.
You did not know you whispered it to me always.
I only heard it when our cover would
slit briefly open—painfully, and inevitably.
Your breath in these thin moments was bitter, bitter
to you too.
So we covered the slits and sealed the gape,
told ourselves we knew
all the clothes were off, together, for a reason.
Convinced ourselves we were really touching what was untouchable,
for a reason.

But, if since the very beginning
your mouth was to move that way,
was to say those words—and if your eyes were always
going to look like autumn trees and unsay them—
was it for one or wasn’t it?
Is there something at all to smile about
just passing through our geometry?

I ask this to myself—of course. But,
but
today’s sun blades the sky too much like yesterday’s!
So your eyes return! They return to reach! to pull me out to free fields
as they used to.
Your sundress still sparks an Aztec flame
as the colorless crowd ashes.
To me your scene is still an answer
and your breath can still warm truth
as sweet as tragedy on my skin.

The lining of homes around me
glints light red
and I stare at its light, after you,
your cutting rays,

because your thought of ending
now kisses mine
and so—still—I can answer

whether, as I am now— you were always
only a memory.