Again and again you begin each night
as if this faucet climbs only in the dark
will widen its slow turn
to reach the sink with clouds then settle
as seawater, wait for rain to strike
shatter and along the same path
return as lightning from a fever
that’s not a flower, still trembling
the way her breasts curved
are collecting dew—your hands
are never wet enough
and around your chest the scent
splashes over the great weight
you’re breathing in
—what keeps you in the air
is the full light from stars
kept cold under running water
draining their smoke for the surface
stretching out, lifting the Earth
closer and closer as if once
you had something in half to put back.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 16, Issue 2.
Simon Perchik is an attorney whose poems have appeared in Partisan Review, The Nation, Poetry, The New Yorker, and elsewhere. His most recent collection is Almost Rain, published by River Otter Press (2013). Visit www.simonperchik.com.
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