the sweat at your knees
how we drip and fumble
words slipping like vibrations
down the curve of your neck
the sound of the woods surrounds us
and i leave you there
inside it
do you understand
i reach forward to give us this
the glistening of a moment
the movement of hands
the texture of being close
not like touch
but the way we feel each other
without touching at all
your mind bends like clock hands
circling the same questions
like time when it pauses unexpectedly
and you stand inside a moment
looking everywhere
except where you are
we find time
and spend our lives escaping it
without realizing how precious it is
touch only lingers for so long
like phases of the moon
passing quietly overhead
and i wonder sometimes
how many of them we have left
i feel us together
but never in the same moment
never in quite the same place
always reaching across something
distance
memory
fear
timing
we make meaning from the places
we choose to keep ourselves
and i keep myself in moments
i no longer belong to
because they feel so kind
it feels good to remember beauty
to sit inside warmth
a little longer than i should
like wind against my skin
the sound of air moving through trees
the quiet hum of a world
continuing without permission
if you listen closely
you hear everything at once
the birds calling from somewhere unseen
the leaves shifting against one another
distant cars
your breathing
your heartbeat
your thoughts becoming silence
and everything at once
can feel like chaos
but beauty lives there too
the birds chirping
the moon hanging above us
the movement of your feet against the ground
my hands longing for the certainty
of something to hold
and i stand before all of this
to offer what i can
my attention
my memory
my longing
myself
because myself
for all its flaws and confusion
is the only honest thing
i have ever known how to give