If you had never lived, 

rain would be one string of water

and books would run as a single continuous word,

because in between each raindrop and the spaces between words 

is a second for me to think you.

And I would think of under bleaching suns

and at the heart of avalanches,

I would think of you on snowcapped mountains

and on tenderly flowering treetops,

at the bottom of wide rivers

and the silver edges of creamy clouds.

I would think of you until my lungs vanished to stardust from suffocation

because your eyes are a flicker of winter stars

that hold my breath each time,

the way one who had crossed a desert holds water.

And my whole body would die for you

like that time when my heart skipped a beat

when I saw your soft black hair fly and unfurl in the wind,

black as obsidian against the backdrop of a cornflower sky

and the flowers that dangled form it matched the ones that rose from my palms.

And like the time when my lips quivered into a grin

when I saw you laugh a musical giggle,

arms flowing around you in the air

and you looked prettier than all the poems I ever had read

and I will always know your face as a beautiful song,

sung from the beak of a pearl white swan,

though I know mine is only a smudge of skin for you 

and my eyes two brown rocks glued to my eyelids.