If I Were a Poet

Each of us is a world,
with its own
map and mysteries,
its own language,
its own history.
We carry our worlds,
and they carry us.

In my mother’s world,
kindness was hunted to extinction,
and the cold and cruel rain
chased her to the safety
of asphalt suburbia.

I always dreamed of a world
where footsteps were drumbeats,
where heartbeats were hymns
hurled at the moon
from a tropical beach,
where we danced naked on the dunes.

But,
I know someone
whose world is gray and dead,
and someone else
who sees just shades of red.
I’ve even heard of worlds so small,
the sun doesn’t fit in the sky.

Each of us is a world shaped exactly
so only we can exist.
But,
when worlds collide,
when you and I intersect,
our shapes connect,
imperfectly,
but close enough to be
a single world
from all the worlds
in the world.