Timing
If it were as simple as winding
a spring, or matching a shadow
to the I’s and V’s of Roman lines,
or an issue of time enough,
then I’d stop our overlapping hands at twelve
and hold our palm to palmers kiss for more
than just a minute and stop the tower bells
from sounding off the sun’s departure.
But I’ve tried enough to synch my breath
to the rhythm your chest rose and fell with,
just breathing along with a guess
and feeling the beats of bronchial distance,
to know that the patterns in meter and rhyme
are different than the ones that keep our time.