Nathan (Poetry)

My empty walls are aching
now the crimson flood has taken you —
flushed you from inside my skin,
leaving a sore vacancy.

I felt you there — I swear, I swear
I sensed you moving in my sleep,
the pulse within that echoed mine,
the flutter that I called by name.

My little fish, who rolled around
the secret lake my body held
in dark suspension, slipped his hook —
high tide bore him away.

The currents tug, obey the moon,
I whispered to you but I knew,
hot waves told me that you were gone —
the waters turned red-raw.

Imagined ghost, you swim so close
behind the covers of my eyes —
my little fish who might have been
the twitch on life’s deep line.