1. Dancing child, poison-turner, lifter
of mountaintops, not even Kaliya
could carry your weight. Can I?

2. Statues say I hold you.
Paintings call you light as arctic summer
stars we never see. Art lies.

3. You love the hand I stretch out
always out. That strength. When it clutches nothing,
clenches, when fingernails break skin,
when I scream, what then?

4. I have never been strong.

5. Always stopped for breath
I couldn't find, carried
more than I could, trudged stubborn

6. and loved you.