i think i might know #

i told her i missed her and she showed up in a flock of birds
and feathers and wings the very next day.
she was in my newspaper bundle and tied with a cord and
i knew right there that i would never walk again if she would be
that beautiful for ever, for that moment.

i told her i loved her and she smiled a little,
and i loved the way my name sounded on her lips,
her tongue tripping up every syllable in my name,
my father's name, his father's name, his father's name,
until it sounded like music,
until it sounded like poetry,
until i thought my heart would cry
because it was so beautiful and i couldn't bear
to kiss her
the same way i couldn't bear not to.

can i touch you, she asked,
and of course i said yes.
do you promise you won't think i'm weird, she asked,
and of course i promised.
i'll probably touch you places you don't expect, she said,
and my heart ran away with a white rabbit down a hole before i could catch its toe
so i nodded and put my hand on the back of hers.

it was like putting an envelope around a love letter.

she touched behind my ears and the backs of my fingertips
and ran her thumbs over the bridge of my nose like a bird in flight.
she touched her eyelashes to my lip and her palms to my hip
and knees to mine until i thought her pale breath would make me buckle.

she was magic and air and i wrote myself letters from her
because sleep is the cruelest song with the heart of a tiger
and kiss of a moth, gypsy wings and golden shoulders.
she was a poem without words
and a body without bones
and i loved her,

and i loved
her.