my breath comes rapidly
wrapped around concerns
that never used to amount
to much

the touch and tether of
waking life
of life outside the
figurative dream
that i've lived in for
so long

i'm sitting with
sylvia in her fig tree
quantifying futures
and coming up shy
every single time

your breath is strange
your eyes are huge
and bulging
and i can't believe
anything worth talking
about will come of this

and i wonder if a kiss
means less than i used
to think it meant

and nothing ever lasts
and nothing ever becomes
more than it is

and i know these words
ring hopeless
like the echo of a doorbell
in an unoccupied house