I.
“Stay away, you will drown in her.“
My grandmother’s words echoing, my head a cavern.
She warned me, but in the battle of head versus heart, common sense was not the victor.
II.
Swimming one second and drowning the next.
Thunderous is the applause of our hearts.
Was the sky always this gray?
III.
I inhale what you exhale and my lungs feel heavier with each breath.
I taste you and the vessels that were lost in your wake.
North Pacific.
IV.
40 days you loved me. 40 nights you did not.
Every step you take is soft, your footsteps a trail of breadcrumbs.
I wonder if I’ll find you.
V.
I thought you loved me.
Arctic.
I can’t breathe without you.
South Pacific.
I can’t breathe because of you.
Indian. North Atlantic. South Pacific.
Pools of sea salt bile pouring into my mouth as the last one emerges.
Antarctic.
I never get seasick.
VI.
The storms have stopped, but now there’s smoke in the air.
The trees are burning.
I smolder when she kisses me.
Tiny fires dancing across my tongue.