Words

My first Word
fermented for a time
as conception, an idea
then formed with my lips,
sounded with my breath,
borne of desperation
with a search for blood
amid a cavalcade of tears.

The next two followed
as a slip of the tongue—
Conversing
in the desert night
living in what shade we could find—
Communing
with tiny earthquakes
near the sigh of the ocean—
Conjunctions
joining noun with noun.

The last
uttered with a stutter
knowing its import,
knowing how its pronouncement
would shape the world.

The Words
echo behind me—
A sentence strung on a string—
with only the punctuation in question.