I float where you sunk for our  

pleasures possibly two centuries ago  

Though with these ears in the water,  

Filled long and quick,  

slowed only by the depth of the canal,  

Years mean nothing to me,  

to this body.  

A coolness unable to bloom  

within myself is edged,  

Edged on from the lap of 

the water that eats away  

at my resistance.  

Light dress, light dress,  

She carries me down the riverbank,  

Presses petals to my hair and  

foaming fern to my waterlogged  

ears. In a way, I am like you.  

Utterly sinkable, flowers stretching  

High, as my belly button  

dips and arches in the water,  

I eat air in a way so  

subconscious I cannot for my  

life become  

Unconscious of it.  

I am so like you in a way,  

Floated down, down, down,  

angle our only difference,  

Angle toes at us.  

You down into the river,  

Myself, downriver.  

And toes, flexed as a dancer,  

Dress to my knees,  

Dress beyond.  

Release in the way the water  

balances like an ear seed beside  

my temple.  

Something about the modest length  

of your dress has made the way I float,  

Knees bared, arced;  

A temple.