a murmuration of starlings

you ask the sky but the moon whispers "i do not know, don't ask me" so we decided kissing was the best route to take; i ditched my friends in a warm bar two neighborhoods down. a little riverbank too late at night, in weather much too cold for our skinny limbs, continues its business preparing for winter (nevertheless of us) but autumn is not over yet. you blink and ask questions concerning the phosphene, those dancing shapes of light we see when we close our eyes. i give it a name but you prefer the millisecond memory of the tealights in the grass or perhaps the ghosts of previous lovers from before the great war dancing on your eyelids. are we lovers? is that the word for this? we share first-hand accounts of poetry by Poe and whisper the improbable case of our fragile and imperfect human connection. "oh" you hum quietly (of course) "to rebuild happiness from nothing is such an odd thing." and i suppose it is. "who do you think of when you're with me?" you ask. "well, who do you think of when you're with me?" i reply and we will probably never know where we're at on the subject. i spell words on your palms that could suffocate the heat from a room and writing a thing on your beauty would be a loss as i think i lack the words. your heart beat quickens to the rush of a bloody emergency ward and we should be in love but we won't allow it and that's just fine. we saw the first snow of the year tonight, although i think we were the only ones.




readers