On our sides we are unarmed:
half the hold, so limbs won’t sleep
before we, wishing the whole
embrace, fall to peace.
Under your neck, beneath my arm,
tightly try to keep a flow
from heart to fingertips—until
our weight draws tingles
and admission, that much as we
are made to hug, we must turn
reluctantly, to curve ourselves
in long touch, nose to toes.
Skin then speaks, not in the press
fully armed, but in a million
minute nerves, ours, counting
what ten fingers can’t.
Skin to skin, folded more fine
than any paper crane is turned
we become one shape, a single
sense of all we need to say—
the extent of which we never know,
unfolded gently by our dreams
then close again in sleep, and wake,
to hold, half-hold, find our length.
2015 © Andie Davidson
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