Geographically speaking,
they were in the same place
side by side
at the same moment
in the shadow of a smiling
flood-lit weather-wizened Buddha.
She reached for him.
She wanted his touch
to touch her
to take her hand
to take her
to fall with her
into the Pacific.
She wanted to be
beneath him
folded in his kisses.
She said nothing.
He saw the inkwell of the night sea
and the velvet canvas of the island sky.
Eagerly, hungrily, he drew the constellations
with words and index finger.
Then, suddenly silent, he looked at her
and sat immobile,
quietly breathing the scent
and rhythm of the ocean.
Telephonically speaking,
it was crosstalk—
two individual conversations
bleeding across the same local loop.
She was thinking
he did not love her
he had no passion
no poetry.
She touched his cheek.
She saw no response
no impulse
no pulse.
He was unable to think.
He was held helpless, glazed, rapt, transfixed
by the tiara Orion set in her hair
by the fire of Venus reflected
on the water's surface and
in her eyes.