Grave Diggers

For Richard Siken

When we met I became aware of the hole I’d been

digging for decades, a ditch of sorts, a burial plot for my

feelings, my secrets, all the ugly bits. Twenty four hours

later I stood in the shower thinking of you, the way your

left hand gripped your coffee cup, how your eyes looked

quickly at me before they nervously looked away. You

said, in other words, you said, you don’t want this, I’m

flawed, I wear my mistakes around my neck, a tie pulled

too tight, a noose. Two shells, the undead, going through

the motions among the living. You climbed down into my

pit, held the shards of glass to the light, cut your finger on

my edges to show me how you still bleed. Come lay in

this grave with me, I beckon, imagine in this darkness the

dirt they’d throw on our bodies if they knew how our

hands held each other. Feel how alive you feel as the

earth fills in around us. Wanting life will be our death.

Love, our resurrection.