Romantic Rope

We wage protective tug of war with our affections,

our rope taut by us flirting with the mutual threat:

“Maybe let myself go weak?”

and then G-force would pull the other to muddy self-sabotage.

“Do you dare?” she teases.

“Do you?” I counter.

But I only allow a hypothetical descent

into lovely

dangerous

abyss,

my

Amy. Before I fall there,

her attraction for me forces my might to yank her back from her abyss.

My grip stays tightened by communal stars above our childhood backyards

that thread the rope’s strands, one being her question those years ago,

“Do you remember me?” Thinking back,

I saw (feminine blur) at my brother Jimmy’s funeral.

She then tilts a past loose board in a present fence,

and sneaks into our reunion/introduction. “You have his eyes.”

My past poured like a rainforest down a stranger’s face,

time portals for pupils. Connecting instantly,