BOS to LAX to MEL

For Nikola
by Maranda Greenwood

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An ocean and a decade rest between us, that’s 11,000 miles

and a generation. Everybody has something to say about it.

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I lay next to her in bed, her sleep-tongue licks her lips

every few minutes and her eyebrows move as though

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they have tasted something delicious,

like vanilla or bourbon.

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Tonight she sleeps with her mouth half open.

The globe on the nightstand backdrops the shine on her lips

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making it look like she’s drinking the pacific,

closing the distance that will separate us.

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I am learning to love her in kilograms, centimeters,

millimeters, Celsius, wrong-sided and accented.

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She reaches for me, thumb stroking the inside of my wrist

as though the raised tattoo ink is real feathers.

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I run my hand over her identical raised ink lines,

and the smooth white scars that rest beneath them.

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She’s dreaming and unaware that I am learning her

in tiny details, at once familiar and foreign.

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I repeat them now, and every night

to lull myself to sleep—

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kilos,

centimeters,

millimeters,

Celsius,

left-sided,

“bettah”

sleep-reach

sad hands,

wrist scars,

drink the pacific.