We misremember often
from details of skinny
dipping, summer of 97,
the Black Sea, to the way
it feels to rub our fingers
across each other’s skins.
I haven’t seen you in years
except for virtual late-night,
middle-of-the day versions
of ourselves. We lay bare
parts of our bodies to prove
we remain as desirable as
ever. To turn away is to give
shape. We turn our hearts
from sorrow and a blind eye
to the way distance cuddles
in between, at times heavy
as a bottom rock, mostly an
unspoken urge for abundance.
This half-lived, halved in halves
breathing exercise is but
an accumulation of absence
we made into a heaven for
the rapids of our hearts, some
braiding of metaphor and loss,
and how many kinds of vanishing
can we hold into our mouths?

Clara Burghelea is a Romanian-born poet with an MFA in Poetry from Adelphi University. Recipient of the Robert Muroff Poetry Award, her poems and translations appeared in Ambit, Waxwing, The Cortland Review and elsewhere. Her collection The Flavor of The Other was published in 2020 with Dos Madres Press. She is the Review Editor of Ezra, An Online Journal of Translation.

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