I cannot reassemble us alone,
All the gifts remain unanswered,
latitude and longitude
have split this blossom.

These waters will carry me
back to where a torch was first lit.

All the signals flow into me once
I reach this haven's deepest vein,
where we are told through diagrams,
storied glyphs adorning stone,
woven with cartography.

I see your name in everything here,
your careful script in each grain of sand.

This geography was marked by specters,
edited by lovers that believed
their luminescence was unlike any other,
we were also drawn by darkness.

However flawed my understanding has been,
I once tried to leave no point uncharted.

Sometimes I remember nothing but the ocean,
sometimes I only recall smashed glass,
spinning needles and disfigured metal
cutting through our fabric to manufacture
a vacuum for us to occupy.

I lit each wick as a gift for you,
we cannot cut these ties by candlelight,
this museum for the devoted
recognizes no ceremonial flame,
only what was formed and torn
in the moment of our impact.

I see your name in everything here,
all the signals that drew us inward.

The deepest recesses only
leave me with more mysteries,
prime numbers, a billion neurons dimmed,
a coil forever unwinding.

You were the entire world to me,
your geography told one story
but hinted at the geology
that existed behind the wounds,
beyond the love we made.

Where you once saw beautiful galaxies,
I only saw the cuts and bruises,
your eyes were lightning,
retinas like the moon seen
from the spiral of a deep well.

When I offer my hand this time,
extended through time's dark tide,
through glass raining on the tarmac,
meeting fingertips may finally guide is home,
you can be our shepherd now.

I cannot reassemble us alone,
the smile I painted on the cabin wall,
the letters I folded into a thousand cranes,
folded us into clean creases.

You would have admired the meticulous task,
would've traced from edge to edge
the folded moments you said I must release,
scatter along the shore until the water
takes them in with a cyclic embrace.

The letters you once read when
you could no longer take my voice,
ones that you never knew about
because I couldn't bear sending them off.

Each contained the voice you heard
above sirens blaring and beneath
chemical pools spread along the road.

You said to come back here,
the island is already waiting
to coil our parallels together again,
the signals will flow into us forever.

You placed my hands to your form,
one to feel a final membrane
quivering within your breast,
the other to feel where life
could no longer be cradled.

The last sound you made was her name,
the one I will see in everything.