tragic morning

we met between the moss patch and the rock,

tentative, I extended my antenna,

I feared you were predatory,

I’m so soft, and life’s too short.

you oozed excitment, I could smell.

you too, felt the dampness of the soil vanishing, and the ticking away of time.

we will soon shrivel, or carried off by the raven. the storm in my heart stirred.

i felt you with my radula. you did not object, enticing me, with froth.

we then locked our tracks, deseperately sucking on each other, fearing separation .

the kids found us then, they tore us apart, just when the jelly was right.

I do not know what became of you, my love.

the salt burned only for a while.

I melted away, leaving only the calcium, a monument to our temporality.

but perhaps all was not lost.