I look at you now and hear a song I could never play.
A poem I don’t know how to write jumps off my tongue
like a miracle of a fish off a diving board, but oh,
I used to write you buckets

of lines that almost said what I meant,
buckets of words that nearly cooled the fire
that made me want to leap out of myself into you, buckets
of words, letting them pour across

all the parts of you my hands desired but
didn’t dare to touch, pouring across your skin
which sang to me, flute to snake, a promise to bridge
the space between us as I prayed

that I wouldn’t drown in my own buckets
of sweat because seeing you felt like eating spicy food,
that I wouldn’t lose you for want, for desperate want of
a bridge or a boat.