Go slow.
I inherit everyone else’s heart instead of my own.
Maybe this isn’t mine, but yours.
I am a grenade and a love note all in one,
and it is anyone’s guess which of those will end up causing the most damage.
Go slow.
I once read an old Greek story about a woman who placed a single stone
in the roof of her dead husband’s mouth every day for a month,
until they clacked against his teeth and fell to the floor like windchimes,
as if he were speaking to her all over again.
This is the same way I love, live, whatever the difference between the two is,
with palms that have held silence far too long to remember
what language gives, what language takes away.
Go slow- maybe I’m not used to this.
To the way you look at me like a synonym of the split second
between a bird’s egg teetering on the edge of a nest
and its nosedive over the side into yolk.
My body was a pianissimo
until you wished it into a crescendo.
Some days I can’t hear my own voice over all the noise my skin makes
at the thought of finally being able
to see the moon as beautiful
even when it’s only a fraction of the whole.
Go slow.
It could take decades before I am finally able
to see myself the same way.