You climb Hawk’s Crag, a cellphone in your baggy shorts,
and gaze into the leafing trees and famous blue water.
You telephone, in love with the skin of the world. I hear you
puff as you start to climb down, still talking, switching
your phone from hand to hand as the holds require.

You sing showtunes sitting above me, clicking your fingers,
swaying your shadowy torso. We flow into each other
in a sensuous dazzle as global and attendant as suffering
until a gradual gathering surges like water over the dam
and together we soar level across the durable lake.

But how can one flesh and consciousness adhere to one another,
when we know that every adherence ends in separation?
I long for your return, your face lit by a candle, your smile
private as a kore’s under an inconstant flame—as I stare
into the flat and black of water, knowing that we will drown.