is it is

i am starting to see you

in places we never visited

but where you still

leave me

first at a subway

that closes as an oyster

with the smell of an ocean wafting

though i am miles away

which is to say i do not know where

i am

only where i am going

which is away from you

which i suppose is also

a way from me

life happens

in gross exaggeration and underscored delays

that build in the bumbling incoherence of a foreigner

excited to show the language

that was picked off me and used better

because i do not understand

how i could have nothing to say

when time waited untouched

i watch birds move to warmer climates

wondering why they do not just stay where

there is heat and love and mating

instead of calling out to a journey ahead

that must make it worth it

though not all survive

and even less live during

you cast a shadow of your hands on my neck

as you come to hug me after years

of other spaces and pauses

surrounding you

and you look looked

and done with did

and you smile as i had seen

in the going geese honking to the trafficless sky

though today it is empty

and all i have is you

not much

but enough then

when we sang of summer and the forever flowers

and the moments that will always rear sun

strip sun

take it all and take it off

for you are you are you are you

while i greet a goodbye in naked defiance

not quite erect or standing

but not as soft as the shadows

that curl on my throat as a tie

or perhaps

a knot loosening

to ends