Emily

At the edge of all Emily had ever known,  
A decisive moment held her in fierce embrace.
Adrenaline coursed like a raging stream  
Through the veins of her body.
 
In that fragment of her life, all was vivid and clear,
Her boyfriend lay naked beside her in the bed of her childhood,
Two teens in a new town, a world away from past lives.
 
Emily felt his entrance into a place she’d protected for seventeen years.  
There was a presence, and an unexpected warmth.
In the seconds that followed, they discovered a careful, pelvic dance that brought great pleasure.  
She blushed, I’m fucking my boyfriend, she thought.
In those moments, she was the sum of all her yesterdays,
—she was a child of the universe doing what children of Earth have always done.
—she was the same girl that once cried on this bed wondering if she would ever be pretty.
—she was the same girl that danced and then smiled at her parents’ applause.
—she was the same girl who sometimes cried at the theater when a girl with her name said, "Oh earth, you're too wonderful for anybody to realize you.”
 
There, in those moments, with that boy, she thought of those words. Yes, the earth is too wonderful.  
 
In that bed, a cradle of her becoming, she would be much more than she ever dared to dream.