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what is there to convince me
that a night spent huddled in the warmth of the earth's core
that the light of the hazy, unfocused stars
can pull
in the same way, or better than,
the warmth of a breathing human
light pulsing off the nearness
of uninterpretable eyes while
the naked body fills the spaces between
blanket, leg, unspoken context?

liberated beneath a velveteen underworld
twisted trees and soft, un-existing galaxies
it would have been different, perhaps, to
have slept in the tent
and not outside of it

i am not convinced
that all time lost can be regained
or that my best and longest lovers
will always accord in their invitations and dreams
certainly i am a man of nature and of sound,
the shadowless non-contrast of a world
clothed in nighttime

also too i believe in heat.

what is clear, beyond my own simple context
is that there is breath either way, inhalations
of the greater kind
having made the choice
between one way and the other
i will choose next to stay close
even against the beckon of a cold spring night.