Reply to Ada Limón’s ‘Lover’

i am too used.

when the lover comes
back, or the word
comes back,
and the world and the lover
and the word come
back,

I do not trust the world
that much, or the lover
as such, or
the idea of a
blissful release.

this pleasure behind
us was once
before us,
like the back of a
lover leaving
our tenderness,
our jokes, our softness,
and the water from
our eyes.

i am too used
to this kind of
returning and leaving
like at the end
of a business,
what the handshakes
could mean.

when the world walks in,
or the lover or the word,
i am ravaged; used all
over again.

leonell echa