Standing in front of the burning painting

Standing in front of the burning painting

you turn to me and ask if I believe

in the concept of fate, and whether

we have known each other in previous lives,

tethered together by an invisible red thread

grown thicker and fatter each time we’ve touched,

they call it inyeon in Korea, and yuánfèn in China,

though there’s no direct translation for it in the west,

and I consider that maybe we began as a red ibis bird

perching on the branch of a Jacaranda tree,

momentarily free from the burden of flapping -

the fatigue of having to soar,

before grooming each other into cats

on a wall in midday sun,

and as we study the brushstrokes

we move through all the animal forms we once were,

two foxes roaming on Greenwich Hill

picking off easy prey fleeing the fire

that bathes our edges in orange reflections,

a warmth exaggerated by the wriggling mice

making their way through our guts -

maybe one of us was the mouse, and the other

the apex predator,

can fate make a creature this desperate to be touched

that you would let the sharp canines of a former lover

cut you off at the jugular, and you, squeaking

your final notes to the stars, take it - gladly, hungrily -

because this is all you’re scheduled for until the next lifetime

when you may be nothing more than a drop of rain on their forehead

or a floating molecule of pollen, breathed in and sneezed straight back out,

what I do know, I say, spinning on my heel to face you

is that we’ve entwined the most in this lifetime, swallowed

more of each other’s saliva, picked more hairs

off our extensive knitwear collections than ever before

and that finding each other may just be one

long

strange

habit