KISSES

Surfacing warm

between my palms

like an unknown

prayer

now incarnated,

here’s your face,

here’s a kiss

it engulfs

rapt whispers

and small words

are swallowed whole unread

and are then left unsaid.

It samples

like an especially strong

and delicate tide

softenesses and teeth and sighs

Until our mouths

taste alike

and our smiles

seem the very same smile

like to like to like to like

and at the center of our eyes

questions rest, now answered

the answer too fine,

too simple to forget—

just your name and mine.

Boundaries adrift

like rain kissing red earth

look, your knuckles have ripples

already pressed into them

look, it’s me again

an expanse of sea

swaying in contentment…

here at water’s second side

i may happily drown inside you

Simultaneously pebble and pool

And tide