Bili’s one of my two best chums. She's exquisite, cagey and ferociously funny - compared to her I’m tomboyish.

Her hair is a straight corn-silk that shines like black-enamel. When we watch movies, I get to brush it. Her heritage is Japanese, she has perfect, warm-ivory skin, but she’s as American as sarcasm or gun-violence.

When she talks to me, sometimes she’ll be flirtatious or motherly, but always jocose. She bullies me, good-naturedly coaxing and chivvying me onto the trajectory she selects.

I’m jiggered - I enjoy being treated like a pet. I’ve been so harried lately that it’s somehow calming. I think I’m going to spend the rest of the summer, blithely letting her arrange me.

I just
Want
To fall in love
With my best friend

But I'm scared
Of the consequences
And how
It would affect
The other people
I hold dear

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I've never been
One to have
Crushes
In fact
I always thought
Myself weird
For that very same
Reason

Until I met you
That is
Until I fell for you
I no longer
Thought myself weird

What is weird
However
Is our double helix dance
Of flirtation
And friendship

Constantly either moving
Toward each other
Or away
Drawn together
Or apart

It's so weird
To me
That I still keep
Crushing
On you
For its entirely
New
Yet so
Old

Hopefully soon
Our dance can end
And we can
Just be honest
With ourselves
With each other
And finally kiss
In the middle

A conjunction of two words,
each separately has its own meaning.

The soul is the immaterial part
of what makes us human.
The  intellectual energy that makes
one immortal.

A mate is one of a kind.
A companion.

So how does one know if you have
truly found your soulmate?