Insoluble

Her gift to me unsolvable,
a steady heartbeat thick with blood,
recognizable quiet, full speech bubbles
above a sea of strangers. We cross paths,
railroads, wavering map contours
that encircle joints, street corners
where we meet and become a little more
like each other.

If I managed to love her,
somewhere in landscape’s dermatology
there blushes a tingling echo concealed
as birdcall. If in harmless studies
of passing-by, we inflicted loneliness
on one another, a canyon has closed,
a soul dimmed, disguised
as night.

My gift to her insoluble,
a canticle melts down a phone line,
promises of fidelity, roses awaiting arrest
in the web of a flower-shop. We dislocate
faces, landmarks, jumbled harmonies
of untraceable laughter. We form collages
that endure—choruses of our soul’s refrains,
kisses collected on our collarbones—
hoping our histories dissolve.

A graduate of Mississippi College, Amy Lauren authored Prodigal (Bottlecap Press, 2017) and God With Us (Headmistress Press, 2017). Her poetry appears in The Gay & Lesbian Review, Cordite Poetry Review, New Orleans Review, and elsewhere. Drop her a line at amylaurenwrites.com.