Echo
The sadness of his surface
made pockmarks, sweat sheen.
And then they were in the dark:
there is no twilight in caves.
He was moving in the grass—
They were falling face-first into everywhere.
Texture-hungry—
Her laugh like sparks, a grinding
saw, fear-look:
He wanted to curl up against it,
fetal and grasping.
Steam engine—
But the cave was singing
as she used to at night, a scared child.
Knitting a shriek—
It wanted someone to answer back.
He was a braided tongue.