Possessive

Every time I hold your hand

I feel like I’m touching the universe

I said, walking down the train platform
Our forms shuffling through the night

On it is the residue of every hand you’ve shook

Pencil you’ve held

Door you’ve opened

Sprinkling onto my palms

Every finger that inhabited earth before you

The skin cells of all the creatures

That we share this planet with

He shifted our cupped clench

To the intertwined lacing

He knows I like better

I wonder if kissing works the same way

If you reach for my lips

Will I taste all the girls you’ve held before me?

No.

He told me

Holding my face in his hands

Because kisses exchange more than atoms

I pass through my lips
slivers of my aorta

Memories and moments

Organs I didn’t even know existed

And they decay much faster than skin cells

The shards I donate with each collision

Are only for you

Good.

I whispered

Because I’m not willing to share them

With anyone else.