The Seduction of Being Seen

You get to know a place
The way you get to know
A lover's body
The way it moves
In relation to you
The softness of its breath
On your skin
The way it smells, the sounds it
Makes in the morning
And the evening
And when you're climbing its tallest peaks
Diving deeper than you thought it would let you
You remember the feel of its skin, that earth,
that dirt or sand or moss or pavement,
Did it give or push back, did you
Settle in or drift through
Did you merely coexist, or exist in tandem?
You notice what the place is without you,
Its wholeness without your participation,
Admire its curves and miles of flat nothings,
Pockets maybe only you thought to notice and treasure,
a freckle under an eyelid, ferns the texture of dot candy you ate
somewhere on the Cape years ago, snake plant
growing up behind a rock, the creatures harbored

in its caves and crags (warning: they lived here first),
A private sunrise alone, a gift,
Naked and soft and foggy and full rainbow of feeling.

The wind is different here, the brush of it
on you, then the slap of its hand on your cheek,
Or caress - you know its moods and desires
By the force --
Some days you worry you might get sick of it,
Or it of you
But instead each return, each visit
to the same stretch of sand
the same bigger-than-you-can-account-for bird's eye view,
the same naked pink saltwater sunrise,

Each nightlight-bright full moon in its omnipotence,
Each hour spent in each others' embrace
only deepens your desire

You make a place a home
The way you make a lover a home:
By small measures
of observation,
Allowing space
Within vulnerability.
Sitting back and seeing the secret,
You become the secret:

It is a Seduction
To See and To Be Seen

Christie Flemming