by Clara Burghelea

The day was here
and then it was not.
It could be never more
or less than that-
a chrysalis of promise.

In the realm of lost items,
where earrings, buttons, coins,
chances, words, gazes
cluster like beads,
tongues wait to be awoken.

Time’s swiftness lay
in the small details of our skin,
innocuous in their layers,
fragrant when tasted,
pecks of light on its geography.

In the unbridgeable gulf
between before and after,
we were inside,
love swishing in our mouths.
I have kept everything you shed.

Clara Burghelea is a Romanian-born English poet. Recipient of the 2018 Robert Muroff Poetry Award, she got her MFA in Creative Writing from Adelphi University. Her poems, fiction and translations have been published in Full of Crow Press, Ambit Magazine, HeadStuff, Waxwing and elsewhere.