the air around me
shakes and rolls
like a poorly made snowglobe
or a bingo cage, but instead
of numbers, it’s shuffling
oxytocin and dopamine, the happy hormones.
and instead of porcelain snow in water, it’s
glitter smiles in joyous teardrops.

the sweetness and convenient metaphor
of a starbursts candy in my mouth
melting and swirling and buzzing on my tongue
your hand is a pink lemonade supernova i can
touch until my teeth rot out and i
smile gummy gaps to make you laugh
and make the cosmos shimmer with a
sugary celebration and glucosic glee.

we slashed through the night sky with glow sticks
in our hands, in the parking lot, in august,
leaping over headlights and spinning
around lamp posts, these spotlights on
our summer dance.
the campus was our orbit and
you were my glitchy gravity; either
pulling me back to earth, or launching my heart into outer space
your laugh echoes off the pavement and i
see your skin bounce fluorescence;
an undeniable sonic doppler
neither of us have the powers of
chemiluminescence
but you broke something in me and i started glowing.
i am still glowing!
we were both glowing.

i feel it all and i know something is working
something is clicking, will click, has clicked
somewhere, here, nowhere
photons lined themselves up and got to work
when otters hold hands and float to sleep
when a glowstick snaps and explodes yellow
when fireworks fizzle in a thousand rainbows
when dopamine floods the bloodstream
when voices crash and harmonize spirituality…
when sugar ignites in your eyes

when you smile and laugh.

thanks, universe. :)