Shimmer - April 7th

Beach House

A wave hits sunlight like a camera flash:
capturing the moment you carried her
on your back. The way she looks
wearing hats & bikini-covering shorts.
Her eyes squint like finely-shaped
breaking waves, a surfer riding the tube.

You sift through the sand, the grains
that shimmer the way she whispers love
you, stupid dumb idiot asshole dumb boy,
don't notice her swimming, always swimming,

picking sand from your teeth. She tastes
like the beach should smell, you eat handfuls
of sand, grinding down teeth and bone.
Dissolve into sand before she catches
her first wave, that's when you notice. Crave

your grains stick to her
wet skin, sunbathing, admiring
the view and shine.  She builds a sandcastle
out of you, carefully compacted.
You wait for the tide to take you out
to that sea. Maybe she built you
far enough away. Maybe she'll
stay long enough to keep the gulls
at bay. Keep your castle doors open,
let her build you sturdier
and your moat deeper. Write yourself
into my walls, forgive me for seeming
too damn busy looking at grains
instead of being them.


Teller

When someone asks for my number today
& the plate tectonics crack,
or the other way around.
Politely decline, thank them
anyway. Notice the shimmering eye
shadow. I don't mind,
let it remind me of the nail
polish I forgot when holding hands,
when Pangea was good enough–
don't notice the size of my circumference.
Feel the plates shifting, the shores forming,
nail polish chipping, grip sweaty.

Would she paint my nails on
our first date? Politely mention my asymmetrical
eye makeup? Photograph me inside
her clothes? Let her hand me
my change. Keep the number close,
a single super continent wild
with every color I want to see.