I can still feel you there.

Dancing to a different history,
music floating in from another time,
worlds away from that violent road,
that was always love to me.

Just remember it was only a little death
that would seize your bare thighs,
the kind that we all survive 
but are left forever changed from
where wheels move to bring us
face to face again as strangers.

Perhaps ready to love one another the right way
until I finally see how to save you from me.

I thought your skin would bring us back,
somehow make us whole again.

It all becomes a fever dream
when I am too connected to you,
when I try to let you go.

And I wish I could be exempt
from your careful touch as if
it was always our first time again
and maybe it was all my fault,
living this way too long in the dark,
folding and unfolding my quiet heart,
identities forever merging and splitting.

But I do not know a way 
to slow this menacing engine down.

I can still feel you there.

But the flaws crept through
whatever history we would choose
along our dark sinuous road.

Just remember it was a little death
to be so vulnerable and open to let 
another identity gracelessly slip inside
and immediately be so at home,
to penetrate unknowable mystery
and still wish to stay.

That was love to me.

And I wish I could be exempt
from the warmth you devour me with,
and maybe it was all my fault,
only reaching out to you in the dark
where I can't tell my pain or yours apart.

I believed our skin would bring us back,
would find a way to merge you with me.

But I do not know a way 
to slow this menacing engine down.

It all becomes a fever dream
when I try to let you go.

I will always feel you there.