Salt on Skin
You docked in foreign ports while I stayed ashore, counting waves and wondering why the wind had changed. I tasted her name before you spoke it, salt on your skin that wasn’t mine, a betrayal carried with the tide. We broke beneath the olive moon your voice a knife, my throat a flame the parting came out of the blue, too soon, and still, I understood, gave you the blame. The sea stayed still, but I did not — I cursed your name and all I’d lost. Love curdled slow, like milk in the heat, I hated your name in my mouth, how it stuck to my teeth like ash. Hated the loud silence you left behind, the way I couldn’t sleep without you and how I looked for you in empty rooms. Two years of silence, sharp and wide, I built a life you wouldn’t know. I swept your ghost from where I’d cried, burned every memory, tried to let you go, and slowly your name lost its sting— the weight it held, the hurtful ring. We sat on the beach, salt in the air, wet from the swim of our favorite sea, you said my name like you used to — like no one else had ever worn it, like two years hadn’t passed. The wind picked up, and just like that, I forgot how not to love you You said you missed the way I spoke, the hush I left between each word. I smiled, but something in me broke— a truth too heavy to be heard. We can’t pick it up where we left off we’re not the same, it’s too tough. You kissed me like nothing had changed, like years hadn’t happened, like we hadn’t sworn to stay on separate shores. And for a moment, I let you. But how do I trust a ship that sank me? How do I love what tried to drown me?