Lioness

When I was with you we were an estuary

I don’t know if I come from the river or the sea

All I know is you are both my opposite and my reflection

And where we meet, all salt and mouth and convergence

We were the meeting point of a mountain and a valley

From a distance it is clear that we are inverted forms of one another

Should our mountain crumble it would fill the valley to our brim

Creating flatland where there was once chaos

But until that beautiful collapse we wonder where you begin and I end.

We were two bodies running out of room in this world

We carved space in ourselves for the other to borrow

For the other to burrow

I wake up sometimes with ghost traces of your lips on my bone

And my arms holding your phantom

Frame as you drift away

We were roots and soil

The splendor of a tide pool

We were giants

But for now we can’t swallow the things that separate us

Lioness please grab me again by the scruff of my neck

And lick the wounds I’ve made trying to taste my own blood