Before August

There is the heat outside
the real kind
coming off the pavement

Pressing itself
against the windows
making everything shimmer

Like even the world
doesn’t know
what to do with itself

And then there is love

Not soft
Not always

Sometimes love is August
before August

A warning in the chest

The air too heavy

The body asking for relief and still walking
toward the sun

It is the kind of heat
that reminds you
you are alive
before it lets you breathe

A dress stuck to skin
A throat full of words
I do not say

My hands behaving
as if they have not already memorized him

The ache of distance
when the body
already knows
what closeness felt like

Love has weather too

It gathers
It breaks
It darkens the room
without touching the light

It comes back
as if nothing happened
as if the heart
is not a house
with every window open waiting for a footstep
it has no right
to recognize

And I stand in it
sweating, glowing
half undone
half lit from within

Trying not to worship
what is burning me

Trying not to miss
what is already here
and still not mine

Knowing some fires
do not ask
to be understood