at last it rained.
the clouds spread their blue, blue eyelids.
too long we embraced the sun
the round yellow arms the dusty fingertips
for decades it seems the heat we 
believed was everything
imagining in this bottomless desert
god spoke through a dry mouth
whispered rasped through dead leaves.
then, a drop. 
a drop.
and our tongues extended alarmingly
like the hands of starving 
children and another
and another
and this, the story 
of how our eyes were filled how  
the fish learned to breathe without 
air so lovely their gills dancing
like Chinese fans. listen, it is true 
our third eye is made of water
a parting gift to us from the horseshoe 
crab, wise old boatman of the sea
back when we traded leg for fin
and wandered mad and foolish
across the earth troubling things
troubling ourselves but still
it is water, still 
that lubricates
the kiss it is water 
still in the heart's 
thumping drum
it is water that carries the salt 
of our tears to the sea
where it prays
where it reclines buoyantly  
where it sleeps like a calmed god.  
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I am looking for room to die honorably 
           August, a girl who held my hand at last, so lovingly 
a bird that I do not know the name of visited me at night
           I feel the highways contract like muscle for that final leap 
see, if you kiss me here while the days are still so long, it will have to stop 
           we will have to feel our way through the night eventually 
someone's night 
           the things we could do there  
leaves will fall but I will wear my tenderness like a glove until the palms wear out 
           I think the bears are dreaming of dreaming
the nights feel that heavy now 
          the sun wept purple tears 
someone explain this to me, how to reach out when everything is trying so hard to let go 
          I am so ripe I could be cut in two and sold whole twice 
these thoughts and others have begun to trouble me 
          please turn me, please point me home

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