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i.

you named the thread count

of my sheets

from the feel of them

before you'd opened your eyes

you are like that

ii.

some people love

the way they rehearsed it

from a script

they didn't write

in a room

that was never theirs

you love

with the lights on

you love

having already mapped the room

the frequency

the exact pitch

of a thing

before you speak its name

there is no performance in it

i didn't know where to put my hands

iii.

and then i did

the way you go still

when something

is exactly right

not translating it

not performing receiving

the direct line

from the nerve

i learned to wait for that

to want nothing

until it

iv.

i have watched you

trace the seam

in the ceiling plaster

where the damp came through

last winter

and the landlord

never fixed

v.

you arrived

not became

arrived

the person you always were

walking in

out of the weather

sitting down

like the room had been

waiting

it had

it had

vi.

your heart is not a closed room

and some people call that reckless

some people cannot conceive

of abundance

as a practice

as a politics

as love

that doesn't need

to starve another

to feed

i have loved people

the way the landlord

fixes things

vii.

i am a shouting thing

all argument and edge

i have used that

i have used it as a wall

a door locked from the inside

you sat down on the other side of it

and waited

until i did

i didn't plan to do that

i don't know

what i am

on this side

what that does

to a person

what that does