Poem: January 9, 2019

Steady

I return to the photograph more often than you might think-
my favorite image of us, reminiscent if Kahlil Gibran's description of love.

Love one another but make not a bond of love:
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.

Fourteen years have passed so quickly, so it is easy to return to Perdido,
to retrace those original paths along the shore, the distance between

our separate footsteps opening and closing. I sometimes remember
the ocean turbulent and rushing, sometimes peaceful like today.

Here my hair is still brown and the edge of your smile
is visible even though we are kissing, and you are nearly out of frame,

like a mystery to be explored or an oncoming storm.
I can see your amusement as you decide, and that is what I love.

Our chins are touching, and my nose is pressed
against your cheek. Between us, though, a glimpse of the surf.

We stand at the edge of this ocean and through some trick
of the camera angle held at arms length and shot blindly,

the horizon line is tilted, slanting to the left as if the ocean
was emptying itself somewhere beyond the limits of the frame.

I like to imagine that the world is thrown askew even now
every time I lean in for a kiss, and our lips touch like the reach of the tide.

Imagine the power to empty seas, to shift the physical world around us,
while we two hold stead in this moment. Face to face.