a multiple contradiction.

At 7:35 A.M, you lay your tired body on mine
before peeling off, like a slow band-aid.

At 8:40 you sprint home and make instant coffee.

At 9:45 we finally drink it, cold.
I finish your leftover half.

By 10:50 you are already breathless.
I live for every time we overlap.

When 11:55 comes I spend the entire minute convincing you to stay.
You never do.

By noon I put my hands on your shoulders and say, “Baby,
you’re getting thin. All this running in circles and barely sitting down to eat.”

At 1:05 you tell me that while you were gone,
15,300 babies were born.

At 2:10 you don’t say a word,
just come in and kiss me for sixty seconds straight.

At 3:15 we sit quiet, listening to rain falling everywhere
in the world at once: all 15,000 tons.

At 4:20 we pull a little from the tight joint I keep behind your ear.
You do not inhale.

At 5:25 you meet me for happy hour.
My neck already salted, a lime wedged in my teeth,
a shot of tequila sitting on the bar.

At 6:30 I hear the ticking.
I count your heartbeat like seconds between thunderclaps.

By 7:35 I can see you in the distance,
each second a tease until you drape over me.
We always love quick and you never let me hold you.
I dream of drinking you through a straw.

At 8:40 you watch my beard grow 0.00027 of an inch.

At 9:45 we do not speak.
Too many people have died since we last met.

At 10:50 we pray for a meteor,
at least a clumsy kid to spill sugar in our gears.

11:55 is my favorite.
We’re only apart for mere minutes.

But at midnight you’ll apologize sixty times
because it will always be like this.

At 1:04 AM I am already sleeping.
It’s exhausting loving someone
who is constantly running away.