January 26
The first time I saw you, I told you that you were the desert.
I told you deserts are warm. That, the dunes curl into one another, and their warmth is always felt. I told you the desert is self - reliant, it never depends on the rain to simmer its anger, or the sun to create its happiness.
But I also told you, the deserts are lonely. They mutter for voyagers to tread across them. To explore them. To discover the secrets buried under the streaming billows of vermillion red, and the ghosts below the pools of burnt sienna.
I needed warmth.
You needed company.
So, I traveled across you.

October 13
The last time I saw you, you told me I was the ocean.
You told me the ocean was cold. That, the waves crash into one another, and their anger is felt, not as bruises, but as frostbite. You told me the ocean was unpredictable; there could be a mellow day, with the water clear and shallow, the air breezy. But, there could be a day, where the water was navy, and so, so deep, when it held a billion secrets and the air was pushing everything away.
You told me the ocean was a paradox.

November 23
And, we were a beautiful disaster. A stream of cold water entwined with a shower of hot sand. Two inhabitable places that became habitable together.
Two disasters that became beautiful together.
And maybe that’s where we went wrong, because your fire needed to burn and my tides needed to explode.

December 31
You told me I was cold.

January 26
Months after you left, I lay awake thinking. Thinking about how I was a paradox.
And I realized you were one too. The desert was supposed to be warm, it was supposed to radiate heat, it was supposed to be blazing colors of red and orange.
But, the desert at night?
It’s cold, too.