You’re so hot by Jacqueline McCoy

you're so hot

your heart will never break again

once you realize the absence you grieve

is a presence within asking to receive

the magic you perceive is but you staring

into yourself

I wish I could see you from as many

perspectives as your mind composes

I wish I could be the words you write

see from their vantage

to feel your smile as I'm pulled

by your immersive gaze and melt into

meaning

blister into belonging and never scab

every time you hit the right note

your eyes are a slow light ablaze

glimmering through every disappearing dusk

I wish I knew what it was like to be the pen you hold

the way your grip tightens when a line makes you bleed

smearing black ink like a painting touched with a new feeling

the keys you type on with fervor and passion like you mean it

I wish I could be a feeling

to cleanse in the scent of your tears

to not need a sea but dive in the current of

your name

and purify the body that carries you

I want to be the lone freckle in your right eye

to know how it feels to be submerged in a

vision

breathing

never coming up for air

never needing to in order to feel alive

as the rest of your vessels contract

your eyes remind me of another way to breathe

you're so hot

even though you've been silent most of your life

how I wish I could feel what your lips felt

the moment they spoke

feel the way they quivered before separating

the rush of your release

I want to exist as the air they press upon

collapse between their symmetry

and fall into its shape carved by your exhale

you're so hot

I wish I could see you without a mirror

know what it is to really see you

then write a poem about the way I do

what other choice could my body bear to

seep

without a barrier that only shows your reflection

I want to undress the glass as it shatters between us

feel you reach for me like I do when I reach for my voice

you're so hot

when you believe in a dream

let reality retract

until you're refracted in a realm of your calling

how I want to hear the volume of your cords raise arpeggios in the heat of an answer please always keeps answering

I want to be the floor you walk upon

feel the whole of you without fracturing

I want to be the fragment of the imagination you extract

be inside its prism that directs the sun where to shine

I want to feel the sun when its rays devour you

only your silhouette remains

I want to know what she feels

in her knowing of how only she can unearth

your red highlights

through your hair the shade of burnt cocoa nearly black

translate your DNA strand by strand layer by layer

until I'm stripped inside your particles

I want to dive deeper inside your depth

you taught me how my oxygen dissolves if I stay on the surface

I want to be the silence that enters you

feel the electricity of your insight

what it is to be let in through you

let me be your iron

the blood that moves you

let me be inside your veins

when your heart starts racing

like a river that knows where it flows

and how it will never empty but overflow

to move me like you tend to love's motion

is to know me in a nestled notion

in the ache of devotion

you're so hot

you're more than human

poetry written by a god you recreated

living inside you

resurrecting me

no wonder so many angels surround you

it's your essence that penetrates the tincture

pulling heaven down around us

you hide behind metaphor until you're

prompted

to tell me why you're so hot

it was never a secret

you wanted to be seen

your truth transparent

of what you've always been trying to say

I believe first you had to love yourself

become intimate with the muscle that knows more than your pain

the way you glow when you can command grief where to go

to make the vow to never bathe in concealment

for you have always known on the other side

you're so hot

the way you walk through your fears of open spaces

how bodies of water breathe you into the timing of their waves

to permeate your lungs with verses of vitality

the way you feel the panic despite

so you can live enough to write the poem

to write the poem is why you are alive

you're so hot when you think of me

thinking of other women

the way you look at them

in a transfixed glaze

you knew there was no coming back to any other

after the eye contact of the solvent of your spirit

you're so hot

the way you show me how to

keep coming back

keep me from missing you

after you became the first to never leave

keep me listening as your body whispers

indelible ink on fabric so delicate

delving into the geometry of your core

the truth is

how will I ever know another

the way you see me and I in you

I hope you always remember

I know I’m never alone

for you alone exist

- Jacqueline McCoy

More from Jacqueline McCoy ↓

• @kaleidoscope_eyesx0 on Instagram

Mentioned in this episode:

Write After: National Poetry Month with One Poem Only

Write After is a way to encourage poets to listen and write, and use National Poetry Month to highlight how listening to poetry makes us better poets. I know I write the best when I’m surrounded by beautiful poetry–it’s part of the reason I created this podcast, and I want to encourage others to share this practice. We'll get started in April. You can share to #WriteAfterOPO.

#WriteAfterOPO