Vows

Julia Ponder

Our past territories

were lands left behind

with a cadence of urgency.

You move your hands

over my body and so

much has changed

since they began. Could words

describe how to complete

this terraforming?

They exist outside

seafoam clouds, wet dirt,

starling air, and high altitudes.

So, tell me

a thing about you

no one knows.

Then, I will reach back

into my own topography

and find some edge

to meet yours, some cliff of

longing that is the final

piece. Our secrets will intertwine in

a mossy knoll of rock, a fragile

ecosystem that only

we can travel to, barefooted.