Winter Stars

We slept, as winter stars fell like cannonballs
into the ocean all around us, and the wind
came and went like an explosive lover.

I knelt outside the campground bathroom stalls
to thank a god I didn’t believe in for the gift of your existence.

Our love carried no hidden knives.
Was so distracted it couldn’t find its way out of an empty parking lot.
Was instead focused softly on the inch of space between our faces

(as we laid in that turquoise tent
on the beach in a city where we had never been
on that train where I left you
our love carried no ticket
knew no times zones
talked to strangers
learned Portuguese
in a gas station deli
spilled a bottle of water dancing

knew the right thing to do
and did it anyway

our love felt nauseous
after too many hours at the beach
forgot to eat
because airplane food is terrible
and it felt too excited.)

I knelt by the moonlight,
spoon-fed you a piggy back ride
and you laughed like a dozen suns
exhausting themselves of heat and helium,
sung from a throat full of angeldust.

And then we slept,
as winter stars fell like cannonballs
into the ocean all around us.