in blanket & skin

we pressed each other into sleep.
a grey blue room. your hand the same 
size as mine as if we slept ourselves
into each other's bodies. a red shirt
on your closet door. me watching your
posters while you became a fold 
of skin. a burst of a gentle warm water
pouring from my forehead & you telling me
it was okay to just go back to sleep again.
first we stayed there a year & woke up 
to check each other's faces. pools of water.
you boy of ripples. you fragment
of everything. the three books on
your night stand getting soaked from
all that blue. the kind of brief love
that requires more slumber. you said
we should go under. i held my breath 
& swam in your curly hair. beautiful 
beautiful human. we stood up one day 
on the bed & made a fire there though
my water put it out. ash & smoke.
your window open & the curtains blowing
as if they wanted to show us a stage.
there was no street or no city anymore.
we went back to sleep & i dreamed of
moving into the same body & having
the same life. this isn't
romantic this is drowning & desperate
& need as sharp as it comes. 
i asked one century if i could kiss
your chest & you said yes. i made 
a valley there to sleep in. i asked to touch
the lines where your skin had healed.
the scars like two loose telephone wires.
from outside birds came to perch there
& i swallowed another i love you because
i knew it was too fast. we waited 
another hundred years sleeping & sleep.
your cat grew up into a tiger. 
your desk built itself with us watching.
the shirt on the door knob became a bird.
i told you i don't ever want to 
crawl out of bed without you but there we were
driving looking for a mac & cheese spot
you stumbled upon alone once. i hated
that you had been alone once.
upon realizing the place was closed my car turned back
into your bed & there we were again.
i was taking off my shirt & saying
i'm sorry i am so needy. you kissed my collar
still wet from my own fountains. 
another hundred years passed & the room 
was another blue & you were gone & i was
kissing my own joints saying
come back come back. i wanted to cut off
my body & leave it in the water
to distort like the warping wreckage of 
a ship. no i want to hang it on
a doorknob. i want you to pull me out.
i wanted you to point to all these places
on my body & tell me i would be a 
kind of skin one day. every time
i tried to say i love you the love turned
into "live" i live i live i live
you in each blue open window.
i live all winter alone in blanket & skin.