DESIRE CORNERS ME IN THE QUIET
On the beach, I take self portraits with my eyes closed,
standing in water that rises from ankle to neck in less
than a second. In the darkroom’s red glow, I mix fixer
and developer, hang my film to dry and make print
after print. At home, I light every burner on the stove,
stir the sauce and boil water for pasta. Everything begins
and ends with salt: the chemicals that coax out the shadows
that build my unseeing face in the photos I won’t show
anyone, the meal I make for my friends so I don’t have
to tell them I need them, the ocean I’m so scared of
because it reminds me of love. At the bar, the band plays
a song about a bucket with a hole in it and I think
of my heart. I think of crickets rising at twilight
singing for touch, how science tells us the source
of this music is the caress of one leg against another.
I wish I could be as brave as an insect, let this longing
make my body its instrument. In bed, a lover tells me,
your heart is beating so fast. I roll over. I say, Don’t listen.
