When you run your fingers through his hair,
They burn as hot as the orange strands
That streak through the red of his locks
Which are too warm these fall nights.

You’re not sure when you realized that
He wasn’t like you,
Human and soft enough to be pricked by the knife’s edge
That he playfully dragged across his tongue
While looking at you with eyes that refracted the amber light of his soul.

He’s not sure when he realized that he’d stay,
Far past the summer when you met
On the sandy banks of the lake that swallowed light
Until it was the same deep blue of your eyes,
Binding him to your side long after the sun set
And the rays upon the bed’s sheets had faded
Into a warm glow in the dark.

When he runs his hands over your toes,
Cooled by the coming winter
That wraps you up in wool sweaters
And leaves you huffing as he walks by in only jeans,
He realizes that he dare not leave
You to grow cold these coming nights.