Not every fire burns the flesh. Some arrive with breathless stillness, draped in dusk-colored light, a gaze too wide for one face to hold. blinded still – I called to you.
I did not know what love could become when it puts down its veil and steps forward, not as comfort, but as divinity.
You were not gentle.
You stood where the air bent around you– more presence than person, a voice like thunder wrapped in silk, fingertips trailing the edges of my ruin like a priest naming what can’t be saved.
And still, I stayed.
Where are the days when love was a glance from across the room, a laugh shared over fruit and rain? Now it is an archangel descending through my ribs, setting fire to my lungs my soul catching flame with every beat that dares endure you.
You asked for nothing– only that I remain still as you unfolded in the space between heartbeats.
Who are you?
You are not lover, not ghost, but the god hiding in desire. You are the pollen of all beginnings, the storm-light before any world was shaped, the echo that built the sky just to have somewhere to fall.
You are the mirror held to my face after I have vanished. And yet– I call to you still. Not because I will survive the blaze, nor revive a soul, but because I would rather burn in your nearness than live untouched.
Copyright Malcolm Gladwin June 2025 When Love Unveils