Away from others eyes, I drink in the cold. A chill that touches me sweetly, a winter storm that makes love, burning me. My skin is bare to the winds, my eyes closed to the harshness. From by the fire, inside the shelter, look out upon a freezing gust, filled with icy razors. But in the storm, the wind slides her hands about my body, I feel no confining arms. Her lips, so swiftly they move, tasting everywhere, to melt away, to bead on my skin and dance as the wind caresses them. The cold, the bone freezing cold, is consumed but my warmth, but my icy lover is reborn as soon as her hands are seared away, and I am fading. My tears of joy drip as diamonds on my lashes, away from my skin they turn hard, rock, and gem. I collapse against her breast, and it burns. Her burn is so much more intense then mine, her nails take away my skin, this skin, which gets between us, I want to be consumed, and I want to consume the storm.

Sleepless nights shadow your eyes, and stress dusts your skin. You endure, dampened flames flicker in the recesses of your eyes, but your shoulders slump under some unseen weight. I speak low and softly, as though to a sleeping enfant, letting my voice carry without volume. I try to drag you out from under your burden with my eyes, and as I stare into them, and as you see, meet, my gaze, you seem to focus. But you slip back into the fogged beauty of your mind, they grow dull once more. I wish fervently that I could dissipate the haze from your consciousness, but it is a lost hope, a wish upon a star that falls. The only time you seem to be at rest, if only for a moment, is when I caress your hair, you close your eyes, and I watch with such love that for a moment I akin myself to a guardian angel, though one that has fallen. That small moment you relaxed, even if not completely, I wish I could give a thousand more, so that you might open your eyes and not search mine desperately for… I know not.

I remember before that kiss; tasting your skin, trying for control. I remember brushing your cheek with my own, drawing back to look into your eyes. But my eyes never saw yours before the kiss, for as I drew centred, your lips were against mine. I had already made the decision not to give in to my aching desire, so I know not how your lips found mine. An involuntary movement, an instinctive reaction, the strike of a snake, although I felt no sharpness. Loss of control, lost as your soft kiss, tasting of desperation, tips me over the razor thin edge I was balancing on. I urgently return the kiss I’m not sure you meant me to have. As you pull away I try to follow, and when I try to kiss you again, you evade me, turning away. Cold, emotionless, your eyes guarded while your lips, the lips I can’t help but watch, smile. You act like nothing happened, like it was unpleasant, embarrassing, but I remember the taste of desperation, of desire, and I see the flush in your cheeks.    

Time flies yet I feel not a passing moment. And this moment I am in I wish to never end.

Each new moment is counted in our shared breathing, together as one counting off the seconds. The momentary seconds that string together a minuet, and mark the passing of a cloud from our view. Each cloud that drifts across the window, flow together as an hour. Those hours that contain the growth of our combined warmth, the accumulating moments. I listen to her every heartbeat, felt through my fingertips more so then my ears, and as I count the passing time, I realise that it matters not. For while she lies within the circle of my arms, head resting in the cradle of my shoulder and neck, it will be forever purgatory, as the seconds drag, and the minuets speed. I want to move closer, yet I never want to move away. I know these thoughts, and I know I cannot be closer then this, with her in my arms and her chest moving with mine as we breathe as one, counting the passing clouds. I know that, and I know that I must urge her to move away, for she cannot rest within the circle my arms forevermore.

Piercing pain flies through my nerves,

A dull ache takes the place of the first tide,

An ocean of sensation lapping at my nerves,

A wave crashes upon my shores, then leaves,

But the sand is always wet, damp, always.