Leda

In the beginning there was only the moonlight

and the rain

and the mud that was left once the rain had stopped

and the footprints left in the mud

made by my boots from when

outside in the rain I had stood

beside the gate through the whole storm

watching out into the nothing that was on the other side of the fence

and once the rain had passed and I had trudged indoors

dredging the mud across my floors and it was

only the moonlight and an inch of rainwater

collecting in my footprints in the yard and also

upon the thin bodies of the night blooming flowers

from out in the distance

the animals began

talking with the world

and I lay in my bed by the open window listening

to that world being born out there

and I watched the swans drop

from the dark air

to fold the lights of the night sky

into the down of their once soaring backs

and that’s when you came home to find me upstairs

asleep

having tried so hard to stay awake but failing

and you woke me with what I know not

the harshest softness

or the most careful of violence

and your face was the first thing that I saw

in the familiar light of this new place