I love you. There, already, lies the rupture,
the lie. That coarse, four-letter word between us—
partitioned! I/you, subject/object. Love
extracts that backslash like a splinter,
so slight, so painful. Oust that verb and merge us,
my you, your I (deliciously) vice-versa.
One, like two waters: one body of water,
rhyming with bayou. Coupling gets it just
as wrong. We do not make a “couple.” Iyou
is oneself, with no space between: Fleshflush.
We love each other. No—since no collective
is two and one at once. Not even “we.”
What “other”? I, love, you: Pair, appear, apart.
What lovers do and make and swear, we are.