You, My Formidable Friend

I met you, but it wasn’t in the way we’d have supposed we would

In fact, I discovered you, the beautiful face from that picture

It was given to me, but I wasn’t supposed to look at you

You were just the friend of a friend

 

It turns out you were the friend of a couple friends

that eventually became like another family

and so we pressed into one another

I don’t know it from your perspective

but for me, it was like a leaf that falls on a pond

that dips ever so slightly below the surface

the leaf now with water inside its curl

the water resisting, yet still surrounding

and so gently, caressing

and I was the leaf, and you, the water

 

Then, truly, I met you

the way a cloud meets a mountain

both immense and detailed

and you, the mountain, with your trees

and I with my wisps and molecules extracted from every sea

I journeyed between the boughs of the mighty pines

But I could never reach the roots

and you combed through me with delicate fingertips

grasping at every plume

pulling me apart and putting me back together

 

I flowed over you

and you stood strong

you saw through me

and I applaud you

I have ripped apart sails

stifled the air surrounding flames

I have soaked wicks

I have drowned others as they breathed me in

 

We parted, a marred vapor

and a dampened earth

and I revisited you

but you surrounded yourself with a mighty tempest

from inside, and rightfully so

and I applaud and admire you all the more

 

Then, like lightning at dusk

you wrenched the darkness from you

now the cloud

and I, but the darkness

and I led my onslaught, taking advantage of the waning sun

but you fled into the static spark

and with the dawn

I was all but lost

 

You know I admire you, but I remain a damp leaf, marred vapor

a full-moon darkness

and I wonder if and how we will meet again

will it be a Heaven-meets-earth

a white-capped-wave-meets-shore

a thunderclap-meets-silence

 

Or shall we be the poles of the earth

only felt by one another evermore?

 

Gingerly