A rock skips across the sky,
leaves concentric circles of cloud
to wonder at.

You flung it long ago, before we met,
when your mouth was wet
with unformed words
no language could yet convey, and
your eyes shined
like incantations of light,
shapeless, erasing voids.

There are no names
for the shapes that pass me by.
They are whiffs of coffee
teasing blood with caffeine,
dreams I forget the moment
they begin to make sense.

I cannot say how long
I stay rooted here:
Moons have formed,
inspired poetry,
crumbled into dust
occluding suns, and I grow sad
the way I imagine
redwoods do—
asking why all the rush.

Now a wet wind clears the stratosphere,
pours cold air down the back of my neck.
You crest in a heave of foam
and effervesce on shores beyond my reach—
I grow seasick tossing in your wake,
leaning over rails and wondering
why you only come when hard things
skip across the sky and I have
so much to take care of.