I beg you to take me off the market

A first date, and suddenly, unexpectedly, I become insane.

I review and remember every first moment, every first, the linger of the first kiss, the first hand-in-hand (and in and).  Your happy surprise and gaze.  The light in your eyes when you first saw me...and the first time you touched my face.

You say "I want to take you all in."  All in, me.

That sense of familiar.  The primal sense of wanting your hand on my hip, your self behind myself, your senses next to me.

Do you realize that I have been dating (and non-dating) for twenty years, and no one (not a one) has ever sat behind me and leaned down to kiss my leg?

I bruise easily -- due both to my coloring and idiopathic condition (which I always think -- any idiot can bruise easily...we'll discuss the actuality another day) -- but you did not leave a physical mark. My skin, unblemished.  My memory, intact.

You, I have been thinking about, all day.  The first date that goes so well that you think "I'll marry him" in tandem with "I will never see him again."

That fear, of rejection.  That fear, of possibility.  That fear, that he will disappear.  That fear, that I will never see.

We need each other, to see.  An emotional see-saw.  An emotion. You were here for a moment.  Me.

I survey the debris.

Not wanting to wash the glasses, not wanting to put things back-to-normal, wanting to remember your "here" and here.  Not taking a shower so you will linger.  Not wanting to erase.

Your mouth, and a thousand months before. I lean into you and taste your mouth. Before you leave.