by Marge Piercy
We cannot have monogrammed towels
or matches with our names on. We cannot
have children. We cannot share joint
tax returns. We don’t have a past.
Our future is a striped unicorn, fragile,
shy, the first of a new
species born without kind
to hostile kin. We can work together
snarling and giggling and grunting.
Every few years we can gave a play
as offspring. We can travel. We can
go away and come back. We can shake
each other rattingly honest. We can have long
twining soft voiced phone calls that leave me
molten and fevered. We can make each other
laugh, cry, groan till our flesh shines
phosphorescent, till heat shimmers in the room,
till we steam with joy and streamers of light
run down the insides of our eyes.
We can love. We can love. We can love.
Photo Credit: Fertility, SEPhillips, Digital Photo, 2002.