This is Not Carnal

This is Not Carnal
Gracelyn Abel

This is not carnal.

There is nothing like trading breathes with you The way you bruise me with your fingerprints

I can feel my heart rattling in my rib cage Sounds like a beggar shaking a can for change

You have me like gravity keeps the wind from blowing the sky away Like dust, I am gone as air escapes your lungs into my ear

If they were shivers, that’d be fine but they are quakes
They fracture me, the glass cracking, shards splitting me in half.

I want to say it, but I can’t.

“You are everything I fear, and I am in love”
But I fight my tongue, press it against your mouth, your neck Anywhere but where you can hear

My moans are of tender surrender to my sins as I trace this into your skin

commitment is a shadow to you?
You distrust what you feel fearing what you feel is lust

I tangle your hair in my hands because my body commands you closer

I am ice melting into the gutter, every utterance a stutter calling out for all of you Our hips press together – If atoms could touch, ours would be

Time doesn’t exist in the space between our lips.

I love you.
Just don’t say it.

Gracelyn Abel is a student of life as well as academia, currently getting her bachelors in Sustainable Food and Bioenergy systems. When she’s not attempting to dismantle the broken global food system, she is drinking coffee, sun soaking, plant pondering, or snacking on some fresh vegetables. She recently finished producing the short documentary The Butterfly Effect, soon to be featured at a film festival near you! Follow her on Instagram here!
Photography by Gracelyn Abel