by Keith Nunes

watching the ghe nang boats
lip the waves
contort candidly amid azures and mauves

sprinklings of stars glisten on the bay
you apply rubies to cheeks
silver and gold to wrists and ankles
you shimmer, astonish

we’re rising above gardens
all touched by rain where
Jesus’ champagne eyes
are bravura bookends for
verses of the poets

where the space between us
is charged,
where a kiss is a life’s work
where minutes elongate and
callow youths are incandescent

here amid the luster and brilliance
we meet
for the first time
can you feel it?

I Met You in Vietnam was first published in Red Fez online journal (US based) in 2007.