Day 1: The Body

Yay, it's Napowrimo again! Bit of a late start for me this year, but I'm getting my poem in before midnight so it's still a win! 

Today's prompt was about the body. - The idea is to write your own prose poem that, whatever title you choose to give it, is a story about the body. The poem should contain an encounter between two people, some spoken language, and at least one crisp visual image. - 

I broke the rules a little (what's new!). Didn't plan to write about love when I first say the prompt, but what do you know, it was what came out. 

Love at First Sight

You speak

and red corpuscles swarm

like fish through my veins.

Here is the heightening, the bloodrush,

the flurry of feeling making itself known.

Stomach pummels itself, helter skelter

of nerves, dirge and dream.

Stars fall from your eyes

and the universe is reborn in a breath.

I know there will be pain. I know

there will come a time when the wounds we earn

will scar our better selves, but right now

the heart, like a battered prizefighter

rattles its cage

eager to be let loose.

Sun rises in my solar plexus

as it all begins. A tear, like a jewel,

glistens on your face. I wipe it away,

taste the salt of sorrow,

the sweetness of relief.

Swallow the sky

and answer.