When I say love, I say maybe & body & mind & smile. I say hands & laugh & rounded mouths. When I think want, I think wrists & factual curves & omitted corners. I don’t count the ways, but I sigh your name. There is a bridge between us I want to cross. A decathlon for the blessed—I’d do most anything for a little more skin. To land fist-first like a heroine in the pocket of your impressions. To weave a veil from each seize that protrudes from lung & hands & bitten down lips. To admire the tenacity of skin & break down the skeptic’s touch. It’s your face & pleasure & divine. There is no formula to love like they teach children in storybooks. There isn’t one want or spell or body to define it. Until it makes sense for us, there are stone steps worth the trouble. At the end of the bridge, a pair of lips cushion a kiss you’ve bartered off Cupid’s bow. Then, fingers splayed at the right angles to receive a love that fits & fits & just fits regardless, despite, in all ways. Signed, Your PanBi Seagull named after Engelbert Humperdinck’s song, Lesbian Seagull
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Audrey L. Reyes (she/her) is a queer Filipino poet and former early childhood educator whose favorite workplace activity is raising hell. Her work has appeared in several online literary magazines, anthologies, and print issues around the world. She resides in Manila.