BECOMING OCEANIC

by Elizabeth Switaj

 

without burning

when everything is heat & sex
and can & can't and Yes &
yes

     cool breath that draws beads
of cicada-drenched humidity
                         from where they suffocate your neck
can't be transmitted by nerves called love
  without getting caught in reflex loops
of fuck & fuck

                  eventually we wake to no
whether in illness
                         or just no
then skin learns to send   willed shivers to mind

sometimes there's worse heat between
and we want it to mean
  temperatures are cooler
                                that we are not broken
                                heat stroke red for nothing
             and something
is to be said for contrast
after years of maritime mild  it fades

 

 

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