Enemy Camp

Here in the enemy camp
my hand is bulleted with
small cups
indentions from grasping
rosary beads over the last hours
in which your heartbeat has slowed
to an imperceptible drumming
even softer and slower
than the tick of my pocket watch.

I think of the years I’ve listened
to the whisper of breath you
drew and blew into the nights
as we spooned
like matching ladles in the soup.

For months I’ve been amazed
how vividly my memory has videoed
your face as on hot summer evenings
when we groaned together,
you above, me below,
our hands clasped together
as you rode about on
our carnal charger.

The ruminations that occupied our lives,
the hours spent hashing out the details of our days,
our speculations and ciphering over long-range finances,
the wonderings about the exaggerations of the enemy,
our prayers in the midst of conflicts,
all these our quiet mortars of resistance.

I’ve held the ramparts for too long
watching the end encroaching,
our territory threatened,
the space allotted to us by the Timekeeper
plinking away like the sweep of a Sten gun.

Maybe, my breath will cease just when yours does,
and maybe, my heartbeat will stop.
Embracing we’ll retreat
unseen from this fire line of days,
go together
far beyond the enemy’s battlements
and build a bulwark impenetrable.