I wondered ‘what am I to you’
when you gently touched my
sunburned legs.
your hands were dry and warm,
brushing neatly
down my reddened calves
as you sat against the ridged bookcase.
From where I stood I could see
where this was going
but when you asked me to sit down
next to you,
I did.
we leaned away from one another
out into the smooth coolness of the room,
the quiet that muffled us like water.
we didn’t touch;
there were lakes between us.
we walked out into the day,
hot winds blowing sharply
almost scraping on my skin.
we moved step for step
over the wavering asphalt
separating
and then the lakes dried up into the
acrid air and became
sandy cracked ground
two small figures in a vast expanse,
we stared at each other.
but without the blue-green filter of your
thickly silent room
we were unrecognizable