We Thought

We Thought

We thought we knew what love was,

its smell and shape,

imagined it subtle and curved,
petals of light perfume.

We knew we knew how love looked,

and we built it,

a mannequin of misplaced words.

We learned the language of silence,

the idioms of disconnection,

memorized with razor-edged flash cards,

and pressed forward into black,

without legend or compass.

Where we found ourselves was nowhere,

ducking under starlight, lost,

a graveyard finally emptied of souls.

What we knew was nothing,

nothing at all, and our mistake hangs over us,

a sky poked full of holes.

The silence stretches to forever,

swallowing all horizon,

swallowing all sky.

(10.20.11)