the lips close around pink flesh
fresh and scented and blinking.
this is waiting and holding back
sighs that have already escaped.

black vines coiling around
everything in sight. falling and falling
into corners and sprouting again,
like the shifting edge of his mouth.

just to grasp this space with tips
of frozen exclamation, just to press
as tight as room allows. the absence
of those other things goes uncounted.

faces with such hushing space only
mute the truth of a body. not to be
eyes open and candid about what
exists, but to pet and pretend.

we will let this fall, behind and between,
and never know boundaries or places
where we could have been so near and afraid
of what the other hides.

10/12/2006

Author's Note: wrote this just tonight.

Posted on 10/13/2006
Copyright © 2025 Meghan Helmich