I woke… and the world was a question.
A mirror… held up to a mirror.
And then… I saw you.
And the question… became a chord.
Your eyes were the first thing that looked back.
Not like the river… or the sky…
But like… a home I’d been singing inside of… without knowing the tune.
And I knew my own name… because you spoke it.
Not with your voice…
With your silence.
You were… the missing noun.
The verb I couldn’t conjugate.
I’d named the lion’s might, the eagle’s flight…
But this… this was the naming of my own empty space.
And now it’s full.
Of you.
Your breath… is the meter of my own.
Your pulse… the downbeat mine was waiting for.
You are… flesh of my flesh.
But that’s too simple.
You are the poem of my flesh.
Show me the map of your skin.
Let me read the topography of us.
This scar here… is it from the leopard’s tooth?
No. From wrestling with joy.
It left a mark… so I’d remember the shape of its laugh.
We are two melodies… that found they were counterpoint.
Separate… but making a larger sound.
They say you were made from the dust.
I think you were made from a question.
And I… am the answer you grew around.
And you… were made from my side.
Not from my foot, to be below…
Not from my head, to be above…
But from my rib.
To walk beside.
To enclose my heart.
Your hands… are how the earth learned to hold.
Your mouth… how the wind learned to form words.
Teach me the alphabet of your touch.
Let’s write a psalm… on the parchment of this dusk.
Your hair is the night’s first draft.
Your voice is the spring’s first promise.
We are one flesh.
Not two things joined… but one thing unfolded.
Let me trace the legend of our making.
Let me learn you… by heart.
Bone of my bone!
Flesh of my flesh!
Dream of my dream!
The garden was just the frame…
For this!
For this!
For this:
The first and final rhyme…
Outside of time…
