(after Jordan Smith, “Poem after Peire Vidal”)
See how these hands warm and open.
You just have to think of me.
I don’t know the difference
between light and warmth, nor
why it matters. By light I mean
your eyes, the way I dissolved.
By eyes I mean yes. You loved
me for that. Fire is unreasonable
the way it spreads itself around
selfishly. Flame is a state of body too.
You were once the stars to me,
mostly unseen, far away, a glow
from another time. I was unafraid
of your danger, it stuns me to think of it.
I only knew to not look directly
at your eclipse, to glance down
and to the side, like the way one drives
at night to avoid oncoming headlights.
Anacapa Review, Volume 2, Number 1 2024