Two silhouettes in a room
Filled with smoke, voices loud
He came to me, cornered me
Whispered, “Won’t you come with me?”
His arm twining round my waist, pulling me close
And I did, knowing for certain
It would be because of the way he held me.

Our dance began—magnificent, tremendous,
Two rushing rivers of lust,
Two colliding powers of desperate force.
When he stared into my eyes, I saw everything—
The world, the stars, the secrets to our souls.
It was all wrong
It was so right
But it was because of the way he held me.

Together, we moved
Hips joined, breaths one
A fire so deep the earth trembled, rolled, split open
A tsunami of sensation crashing over him, over me
Over us.
We were the tide, controlling rivers, lakes, and oceans,
We were the universe
All because of the way he held me.

In the dark of the night, we lingered close
His words more whispers, his fingers tracing swirls
Over the tender spread of my hips—
“Because you’re mine,” he’d say.
And I would cave, succumb
And feel
Making wrong a broken word I didn’t understand
Because this was right
And all because of the way he held me.

Now, the wash of memory sweeps across a distant shore
But his hands are still on me, his lips still near
The brand of a lifetime
So deep in these pores.
And I know it will be this way,
A long, long while
Because of the way he held me.