with a couple words like Je T'aime I wasn't really
impressed with the way your tongue glided over
your lower lip or the way your eyes shot up like
fireworks on the Fourth of July, which reminded
me of the last time I met someone like you right by
the Colosseum: was I meant to be intertwined with a
historic love or have my heart coded with places I
wouldn't forget such as your arms during the morning
light when we are hidden under the sheets, hoping your
mother wouldn't come in her satin pink robe and sharp
tongue because she said she was too young to be a grandmother
(she said she loved the color of my eyes, brown like mine
were too rare to find) and for a moment, I believed her when she
said I should pack up my bags and find another city to fall in
love with because you'd drag me under the ground and make me
a ruin just the way your father did to her. It was hard to believe
the words springing from her blood, but I left a photograph of myself
in your pocket and ran to where my legs took me. In a matter of months, when I heard a couple of words like Te Amo, I knew it was to start again.