it’s my birthday, i’m thirty, i’m listening to ‘friends’ by whodini & realizing that my best friend might not actually exist anymore & potentially never did? more at 7
as if there weren’t enough
going on in the world
you start to think about how you came to be in it
your aversion to water
—it crushed & molded you,
crowned you,
sent you spiraling through the canal
& towards the light
it cradled your raw body
in your mother’s washing bowl
it thunders now
on your bare chest in the shower
beautiful, terrifying
did you ever hear the saying
blood is thicker than water?
what about
the blood of the covenant,
thicker than the water of the womb?
been thinking about promises lately
the ones between you & me?
remember when we were nineteen,
before the storm made a man out of you,
a memory out of me?
i often wonder if we were only ever
waves colliding,
a ceremony in salt,
gone with the rain.
only time could have hurt us
not fire, not fury,
just tides beating stone:
you let go first,
i let go forever.
every fond moment
every kind hour
evaporates
i can’t hold it, but i know it was real:
there was love here,
there was love here,
you were here,
i was here.
