I bring my whole heart to the midnight flower market. I leave physical tenderness behind.

I enter the midnight flower market and my body recognizes you first.

I breathe in rosewater along my wrist and lose the sentence I practiced.

I watch you hold a bruised peony from the life we almost kept.

I know this meeting matters because I need touch to tell the truth.

I let it happen when the seller wraps flowers for an address I do not know.

I say your name and watch your shoulders soften.

I notice your answer arrive in your hands before your mouth.

I remember how quietly you once learned my body.

I feel warmth become evidence without becoming an answer.

I name physical tenderness before hope can rename it.

I hear you begin with my favorite version of my name.

I let a bruised peony hold the warmth I cannot.

I let your explanation finish without rescuing it.

I finally hear that your hand promises what your life cannot.

I keep my face still while my chest loses its balance.

I reach the delivery alley before my composure does.

I stop when you say there is one truth left.

I face you with only one handspan between us.

I wait for the sentence that could change the meaning of tonight.

I reach for you inside the midnight flower market, but your hand promises what your life cannot.