there are more books than human hands in the universe at this age, now
detailing all of existence, the minutiae
and yet none of them care to mention the possibility that every questions’ answers, posed
could be as simple as your mid-morning crawl
into my almost too-small bed, the press of my mouth to your hair
always conscious of my breath
all too aware of my hands, clutched to the basin between my breasts
fingers stroking over the rosary beads of my knuckles
my shoulders curved to the beat of old memory, shielding this made-body
mouth moving with quiet, recanting some old tongueless prayer for wanting
unneeded in this life where you are here to take your seat at my table
set out and left waiting, once, for someone
for always
just in case

how mournful for they else, them other, that absence
but who more could hope to know it
the quaintness of the fought-for; the tender violence
in all the choices we’d make
again and again, unquestioned
for the glory of the fit to this shape, to eat of all this beauty, root-ripened
seeded in the ancient, tended to inherit, left roaming for our claim

seen before time, known after end
of course, I remain
imperfect, but stay learning
that there is room left in vastness for me to be spread far
for my spill to fill crevasse, for my greedy stretch to soar
coaxed by hand, led by tongue
so
slow, to you, the steward, my intended
I come; I open.

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Wuwa Bo uses she/they pronouns.