When Love

when love floods a person
            it cuts
a canyon

that deepens year after year
            carrying silt
away leaving

the essential person
            revealed
letting everyone see

the layers of yellow
            sandstone, red basalt
grey granite

when love washes over a person
                        it washes
the person away

Copyright © 2021 by Alicia Ostriker. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on April 5, 2021, by the Academy of American Poets.