Estuary

Maybe I was the ocean, come crashing in,
and you were the stream, undisturbed on a quiet path,
when the estuary had us met.
Maybe I overthrew your steady course
with spring tides, over-bounding in unbridled zest,
and you were floundering in my wave shock.

You were the sun after all, meera suraj, and it is said
I was the moon; your moon; terri jund -
riddled with pock marks and wearing away from use,
but still beautiful to your perfect, immortal eyes.

Could it be that gravitational forces pulled our hearts,
like magnets, toward the earth's imperfect face?
And when we struck upon her, like meteors, the waters
nearly had us drowned?
You were grabbing at my neck then, with frenzied claws,
while I struggled to keep us afloat,
then we were swept haphazardly, two poor beached whales,
to the dunes where we first made love.

It wasn't enough.

In the years that followed,
a series of violent storms put out the lanterns in your eyes.
You saw me suddenly as I am - as I always have been, but
not as you thought me to be. What then but to feel the fool?
When I stood again before you, naked, with outstretched arms
like shredded sails on a sinking ship,
you failed to cast your rope.
Instead, tides yanked my vessel further offshore,
the lighthouse pinched its flame,
and I watched your back as you strode down the beach
away from my demise.

Already forgotten were the smells of salted breeze;
the glimmer of phosphorescence;
the caress of moonlight on vulnerable skin.
You had kissed the ocean's lips goodbye
without ever truly leaving.