I look over and there you are

reading on the couch, your messy hair

finally beginning to gray. You are

breathing, moving molecules

of air aside, inhabiting

space that could go empty

so easily. You hold

a heating pad to your side

where I bruised your rib, clumsy

in my hunger for your infinite

variety. ya’aburnee,

lovers say in Arabic—

you bury me.

It’s quiet enough

that I can hear the ringing always

in the background now. A page rustles

when you turn it. Ice

melting in my glass topples

with a little clink.