My dear,
I've just had the most terrifying thought.
One that sends shivers down my spine,
And not the good kind of shivers.
The ones that jab at you in the dark.
The ones that come from boogie men
And monsters under the bed.
This thought,
This fear,
It hits me like a swift kick to the chest
For just a split second.
And then I hear it running away from behind me,
Fleeting footsteps echoing into the distance.
Still partially audible.
This thought,
This fear,
Flees like a mischievous child.
After shouting directly into my ear cavity:
What if you never found her?
The thought nearly stops me in my tracks.
I am the person I am because of her place in my life.
What if I never even met her?
I can barely imagine the idea of this bliss
Somehow not existing.
Maybe another me in some parallel universe
Is truly alone.
I feel sad for her,
That she will never know this
Swirling,
          Terrifying,
                  Mystifying,
                            Incredible feeling,
Something that everyone deserves to feel.
Free will spins a complicated spider web.
Every decision you make
Affects you and the others around you,
Either holding them up or pulling them down.
What if I'd made a different choice,
Just one minuscule detail.
What if I'd turned right instead of left,
Or used pencil instead of pen,
Or carried paper instead of plastic?
One wrong move could have led me off the path to you.
The thought makes me want to drop down to my knees
And thank God
That I decided to lift the branches and find this hidden walkway
Into an unknown territory
That so quickly became
Familiar.
Home.

There are some people who drape themselves across others
like rugs,
who beg for physical affection
like a dog waiting to have its belly scratched,
who hook pinkies and elbows and knees
with their best friend from childhood while huddled under blankets
in the middle of the night.
                  I am not one of these people.
I sit on the arms of couches,
feet turned away from the pile of mismatched body parts
that occupies the cushions.
                  I am not used to being touched gently.
But something about you
makes me crave contact.
     Hand to hand
             Hip to hip
                     It doesn’t matter.
All my life I have been balancing on the edge of
fear and desire
in a world without all of my senses,
and I think
      one touch from you
              a brush, a spark
                       would send me falling.
No, not falling.
Flying.

Sometimes I think
there are not enough words
to describe the color of your eyes
or the curve of your neck,
the way you make my bones ache
or the speed of my heart when I hear your voice.
I think about the lack
the inability
to outline you in pencil and ink
with all the words I know now.
You are something new.
You require a new combination of
letters and sounds.
There is not a single phrase in all of the world
to explain the way you make me feel,
so for you
I will create a new language.

The day after I had to let you go,
It was windier than I've ever seen before.
It was as if Mother Nature thought
If she blew hard enough,
Your windy city and mine might just collide
So that you and I could be one
Once again.

It starts like an earthquake underneath my head.
        Three quick shakes,
              A pause,
                      Then three more.
        Air bursts from her pouted lips
And I run a comforting palm up and down her side.
       "Shhh," I whisper into the skin of her neck
                               So she knows
                               That I know
              That her tears speak for us both.

Tiny wrists.
Tiny rivers of blue.
Translucent.
I'm thinking about making myself a home
Beneath your pale skin.
I'd float along your lazy blue river
Until I make my way to your ghost chest
And burrow myself a tunnel
Deep inside your heart.
Light myself a campfire,
And pitch a tent.
Looks like I'm gonna be here for a while.
I am rocked to sleep with each beat:
Onetwo. Onetwo. Onetwo.
And my heart-house dreams
Intermingle with yours.
Maybe if we dream hard enough,
We can create a world of our own.
Where red blood cells sing like angels
Housed in four chapel-chambers,
And each artery stretches up far
Like a rainforest canopy
Riddled with exotic capillary-flowers.
Can we be safe here?
The heart has tender walls
But it is a soldier.
Though it may be kicked down,
It forges on
And picks itself right back up again.
Always beating,
Always winning.
Your heart is a soldier.
A fighter.
A protector.
I think I feel safe,
For the first time in a long time,
Within the home I've made for myself
Inside of who you are.