Long Before Your Face is Touched

Long before your face is touched
by this summer wind
you can hear it, the sweet breath
of this world, yes

appearances & vanishings
words on the backs of photographs
the bright dead
we loved here by the damaged river

I should have known then
when I guided you along the ridges
wild oat & star thistle
when you braced your body against my hands

our breath stays together
breathing with this earth
despite the broken summer
the paths grown over

(never published, never sent it out; slight music).