Varahi, 3

the nights are long here, Varahi. Say something
that will make me breathe the way
the light breathes. I am having trouble
finding my shoes. the clouds slip away
and I miss them the way lovers miss
the contact of thighs. do you see this dream?
I have kept it in my dresser for decades.
Someone slipped it into a letter
addressed to me. I've lost the letter.
I've lost so much. how are we to hold onto
all these things that are pushed our way
when there is so much space between our fingers?
It was a joke, someone said. the hand and
its stupid fingers. but then I recalled your eyes.
so blue. with both hands I laid my whole
heart before your eyes and never dropped
a single drop. it was serious business,
that kind of humility. like polishing gold.
like being a surgeon to flowers.
here in the dark world someone keeps
slipping green leaves under my door.
they are piling up. it does remind me
of that time when I was a kid. I kept throwing
coins in the wishing well. then, one day,
they were gone. and my wishes, all of them,
swam away. the leaves, too will disappear
and return to clothe the trees. the mailman
will take back all the old letters.
the sky will sail away with all my doors.
the light will teach me how to breathe
the way the sun breathes. all of this sadness
will make sense. I will want all of it, every drop,
the way the water wanted all of my wishes.​
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