Map of a First Kiss

It was not a thing of practiced art,

No movie-perfect, scripted scene.

Just two bicycles, leaning hard,

A space of grass, a world of green.

The air was charged with summer-stuff,

With pollen-dust and nervous light.

A conversation, trailing off,

And then the closing of the sight.

A universe within the pause,

A lifetime in the breath we drew.

The simple, terrifying cause,

Of something beautiful and new.

A clumsy meeting, soft and brief,

A spark that set a quiet fuse.

A single, trembling, sun-warm leaf,

The only witness we would choose.

And in the silence after, vast,

A new and different world began.

The first line of a future cast,

The day I kissed you, and you ran.