You Cannot Catch The Light
after Danna Faulds
You simply can't. Try slipping a dozen photons into
your pocket. Try harvesting a flash of brilliance.
Try wrapping your fingers around a ball of open sky,
the way I did when I cupped your bare belly the
morning I came back, pinning your right leg with
my left, cocooned under the sheets. I watched you
love another man in my dreams. Even here, listening
to the blue jays honking under your warm breath,
I know to already grieve. Even here, with my nose
doused in musky evidence, I still reach. Sorrow is a
valley only love could carve. Orpheus understood this
the moment he glanced back, already mourning in song.
So did Eve when she reached for a taste of her own
curiosity, cupped her palm like a beggar to the apple.
Looked over her shoulder. Dug her teeth.
