Cosmic Variables, by Christie Borely

I’m wrapped up in your arms, wearing nothing but a thong
Every time we move some part of me ends up in your mouth. 
This time it’s my nipple and you suck on me like you need nothing else. 
I hold you and savour the feeling of being worshipped. 
Your body is a temple, I’ve heard people say. 
And when the heat rises over us, you prostrate yourself before mine
Bend low and drink deep from my holy waters 
Like it gives you vigour purpose life. 
You tell me we don’t need to leave this bed. 
We skip 
classes  calls  meals  showers. 
We follow each other 
to the kitchen 
the toilet 
the mirror
Unable to bear a moment without skin on skin. 
Your eyes linger greedy all over me. 
When I begin to cover up you peel the cloth right off me 
And when you stiffen for the hundredth time 
in these past few days? weeks? months? 
It is my turn to worship. 
I make offering of myself my soul my blood 
And rapt, you accept. 
No other possibility exists. 
You can’t imagine a world in which you would give this up. 

We drain our bodies into peace every waking minute. 
A moment finally comes 
when the peace lingers even after dreams. 
You take up my hand and we know. 
We feel it 
A shaking dread. 
The honeymoon will soon be over. 
In absolute defiance we go out and you finger me in the cab. 
We barely make it through dinner. 
You slide your tongue over the sashimi, 
I squeeze my legs together in an almost painful anticipation. 
We wonder why we ever left the warmth of your bed
How we can ever stand the separateness of the outside. 
We make no conversation. 
There is only baited silence, 
Desperate, longing gazes 
and whispered promises of the ecstatic undoing to come. 

We decide to walk home and the moonlight washes over us in a cold relief. 
Suddenly we feel powerful, 
like it’s us against the world and there’s just no contest. 
When you’ve faced demons alone, one trusted ally is an army. 
We amaze each other in tiny moments, 
simply because we’re paying attention. 
Maybe the end of the beginning won’t be so bad. 
Maybe our luck changed when we met each other. Maybe we’ll make it. 
The long haul. 
You gulp and I shudder. 
It’s too big, so uncertain. 
Can the path of shooting stars align? 
Or are we facing collision? A stellar explosion. 
The stink of fear rises from the river and we quicken our pace. 
Wind whips my hair and pulls your jacket open. 
Why did we ever leave? 
We turned this fantasy thing real. 
Too real. 

I look up at you, scared to see. 
Don’t regret me, I think. 
You look back at me and something surges in your chest. 
Fuck, you think 
And you kiss me. 
You call me beautiful, and the dread lingers between us. 
It circles casually around our fingers   between our hearts 
But it reminds us of what’s here and unspoiled 
And now it’s even more urgent 
To know and feel everything everything everything. 

We race inside before real life can steal any more from us.
We cling to each other and burn
But now there are pauses that hadn’t been there before-
Uneasy flickers.
We swallow them. It makes us sluggish. 
It forces us slow. 
The deliberate motion is new
It entrances us. 
Something else is different. A notion conceived.
Something about a slow burn or a slow fall doesn’t seem half bad anymore.

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Christie Borely is an attorney and emerging writer/poet from the twin islands of Trinidad and Tobago. Her multi-ethnic heritage is made up of East Indian, West African, and French Creole ancestry and is characteristic of the ethnically diverse population of the Caribbean nation. She aspires to tell vivid, poignant stories that convey a philosophy of inner peace and strength in community. Her short story Grass is Greener has recently been published in Rebel Women Lit literary magazine. She loves meeting new writers and readers. Find her on IG/CH: @christieborely