While you sleep I trace the tender
green stalk of your wrist.

Over the upturned Earth of your palm
and along each curled stem of your fingers

tipped with marigold. Warm rainwater
pools between our two hands pressed together

like wet leaves. The frown lines etched
into your forehead remind me of tree rings

or keys of a wheezing accordion –
smoothing then wrinkling again.

Its song whistling through your nose on
lazy morning-breaths. Whispering

in and out of the thousand golden Aspen leaves
quaking from my untrimmed chest.

Your blooming into my life marked the end
of the longest drought season.

I smell the dust settling. Hope taking
root beneath the arid soil.

Love’s monsoon moving in over the horizon,
heavy with a blessing rain.

– mrg