It felt as though her body was an ocean, and despite her petite size, she held the power of a thousand men. Sometimes it would wash over your own body so peacefully, so daintily, you could never be sure if you had felt it at all. You could never be sure she had ever really been there at all. The only evidence that remained of her presence was the tingling feeling you always felt after she had left. Always. Besides that there was nothing, as a being so seemingly magical as herself would leave you in a daze, a daydream, wishing she might return, but you could never be sure of that, either. She left you feeling cleansed, renewed, like the world could never hurt you or taint you again. Almost as though each and every drop of water on the planet had submerged you, with no intention of letting you free. But did you even want to escape? Of course not.

Sometimes she was too much to handle, a tidal wave of fury and rage and angst, but mostly compassion. She felt empathy towards all the souls she encountered and would love every living creature with a heart so large I wasn’t sure it could fit inside her tiny ribcage. The force of the waves she threw upon you were too much to withstand, and she would send the breath from your lungs and leave stars in your eyes and a feeling of disorientation. You felt euphoric, a unique kind of high that no chemically encrypted drug could ever bring you close to. And you felt the comedown too. You felt it stronger than a drug induced comedown could ever force. You missed her with every aching bone in your body and your heart felt like it was a time bomb set to explode, triggered by her.

She would always take your breath away. She removed the air from your lungs and replaced it with her own. Your breaths, she fashioned into words. Words of love, and romance, and wisdom. Words of lust. The things she desired most but would never be attainable from other beings so simplistic in comparison. Nobody ever really asked why she did this, but nobody ever really wanted to. The curiosity sent you to madness at night, spending each and every darkened hour awake, with questions that felt as though they burnt holes in your brain. Nobody ever wanted to ask her. They were curious, yes. But the fear of becoming the moon to the sea and driving in the tidal waves outweighed the yearning for knowledge. This is rare within humankind, as the thirst for knowledge is unstoppable. Always wanting more.
More, more, more.
She had control over us, and we didn’t mind one bit.

Up until
a few months ago,
when anxiety
had enfolded itself
around my brittle bones,
when the innumerable
butterflies in my ribcage
had begun
to breathe their last,
when my whole body
had been a gun;
the pen and paper
in my hands were
the only safety switch,
and the poetry I would write
had been my only salvation
from the melancholia
of existence.

When I was little
my father took me to an art exhibit
and stood in front a colossal blend
of hues and tinctures and smeared philosophy
that my unadulterated mind could not calculate.
I pondered the painting
and told my father I could not understand
and he said he did not, either
with a musing look on his face
that registered his scrutiny and brainwave.
But I still could not understand how
one can be captivated by something
one does not understand.
Years later, I met you, and
I think about that painting.
And now I understand.

When I was little
and my mother was away,
my immune system battled a cough.
But I was too fragile, my body too brittle,
so I climbed the forbidden cupboard
in our kitchen
and flooded my lungs with cough syrup
and the drug took over my body
as my delicate knees quivered
and I collapsed on the cold linoleum floor.
When my father found out, he told me
not to ever take too much medicine
or anything
because too much of something is never good.
And now I understand why
they told me to stay away from you.

Your eyes are so ******* captivating
and every time you blink,
it’s like a kaleidoscope
of the sweetest colors
and all our memories together.
My, oh, my,
I see microcosms of cosmos in those eyes.
Stop looking at everyone else.
Those galaxies
are
mine.