The heat is cut off from the cold.
It heaves, it writhes, pumping hot breath.
It wants to give, needs to, but doesn't know
if the cold wants to receive.
It only knows that it reaches out
but can't touch.
Whether hundreds of miles apart
or pressed firmly together
they can't bridge the gulf
or won't.

We're different, you and I.
You've quenched the edge of loneliness
again and again, plunged it into the cool water
to keep it from burning your hands.
You've sighed into the steam and avoided.
I've held onto the white-hot blade,
hours, days, months, years,
until it became a part of me.
Now, when I'm alone
it's part of me--it changes who I am.
You can't see it, but it scrapes against my bones
it makes no sound but I feel it all the time.

I can think as hard as I like,
I can make myself believe all the reasons why you're not.
But then one little point of light slips through that curtain
And catches my eye
Then it flares up
And bursts over me
It fills the sky and lights up any corner I might hide in
It reaches from horizon to horizon
And in that instant, there's no containing you
And all the reasons I've put together
Are contradicted

and the ache returns.

Labels: Poems