Kimberly O'Connor

I handed you my life like
I would hand you a glass of water
we were

basically babies
early twenties
the end of college

where will you go

I asked you said

I’ll go where you are

*

then began

the long journeys, long hikes
up tall mountains

then arrived
the crickets in the bathtub
we trapped under glass
and took outside

then came the spinach
bolting in March
two cats with lost collars

the honeysuckle, zinnias

a painting of the moon

a child like the side
of a triangle we didn’t know
we were

our life a river
flooded with colors
and things
we have chosen

*

you said
I’ll go where you are and
I said okay
I said yes, yes

*

and when we watched
the documentary about
the planet turning to fire

I dreamed
a long elegy

while you dreamed
solutions

*

and if my life’s a long
ocean you’re an island

a rowboat

an oar extending
to my outstretched arm

the man holding the oar

all of these at once

*

I handed you my life like

I would hand you a glass of water

you said yes and drank