backyard

lying on our backs in the soft grass looking up at the stars. the night is warm and sultry, the grass cool and refreshing. the cicadas click and whirl and fill up the night. you take my hand and we just breathe.



"what are you thinking?"

what am i thinking? do you really want to know? because it's crowded in there.

squeezing my hand gently, "tell me."

ok... i'm thinking about how i can smell the warm scent of your skin and how it blends with the smell of the grass and the earth, making me feel safe and snug. how i want to curl up in that smell and live the rest of my life from it. how you make me feel safe without even realizing. i'm thinking of how it scares my heart that anyone, besides me, has the tiniest amount of power to make me feel safe. i'm thinking how it scares my brain more that my (perhaps unfounded) trust and confidence in you trumps my heart's fear of you making me feel safe, making me ok with and able to look objectively at that fear.
i'm thinking about how i would give you anything you ask of me. how i'd probably give it to you even if you didn't ask. how i want to give you only the best me, which is a me that doesn't exist yet, but will when i have a master's degree in my hand. i'm thinking about how you're going to ask for me before the best me is here. i'm thinking about how i'm going to explain to you that the me that i want to give to you isn't here yet in a way that you'll understand.

i'm thinking about that house on five acres with a guest house and outbuildings and a chicken coop and a wet weather creek and lots of trees and pretty slopes with tiny bluebonnets. i'm thinking about how it's just far away enough to be away, but close enough that it doesn't feel like a burden to go to town. i'm thinking about the hammock on the trees upwind from the chicken coop. about swinging lazily on it with you at dusk, watching the fireflies come out to light up the indigo sky. about having horses and dogs and any random animal that comes to live on the "farm". about growing our own vegetables and having lemon, almond, fig, apple and orange trees so we don't ever have to leave that blissful corner. about how avocado trees might not be worth the trouble. avocado smoothies, mmmmmm... ok, they might be worth the trouble.

i'm thinking about where my nest is. or where it will be. and where the sticks and straw are so i can see the materials i'm working with.

i'm thinking about how both feeling the world move underneath my back and feeling your blood pump through your hand makes me dizzy in the most delicious way.