Love Poem with Tumor and Petrified Dog

There is a tumor in my sacroiliac joint 
and snowflakes in my coffee. 

I’m in Iowa with the cats
and you’re in Pompeii.

You send a video: lizards rushing into limestone
which remind you of being a kid in Florida. 

In Florida we memorized sonnets
while leaping around green anoles. 

I’ve forgotten the poems. 
Your black tights, even in that heat. 

Mostly that’s what I remember.
It’s okay to say it straight. 

Like: I’m scared, still,
that I might be dying. 

Pomegranates growing from Pompeiian ash, 
scandalizing propriety—

you send a picture and I do not say,
It just looks like a tree

or Another of God’s secrets 
wasted on me. 

Which part of the mind 
gets you to the soul?

I am reading St. John of the Cross,
a character you might’ve put in a poem:

In the evening of life,
we will be judged on love alone. 

Some petrified dog. Table bread,
a painted doorway. 

You’ve been with me forever.
You know all my angels.

How could I say no to you, 
taking off your earrings to kiss me?