If You Were a Star I Would Be Your Astronomer

and dedicate my life to studying you.
I would spend my years gathering
your unique spectrum readings

analyzing if you were moving closer or further away,
deciphering what made you up,
finding out the specific speeds at which you were spinning.

I would write my thesis on only you.
In the winters, you finally leaving the horizon
to lay in the curve of the sky, draping your just visible light over me

I would go to my telescope
and spend my days adjusting all the knobs, dials,
and lenses and turn the heavy

observatory precisely to your position
to make sure I would see you most clearly.
And as the sun would burn away the day my excitement

and passion would be lit and burn brighter as the night fell
and I would crank the ceiling open and press my eye
to the telescope and look for you.

I would see you approaching
like a gowned bride gliding
down a long aisle of night

blazing past moons and suns and galaxies,
towards me. And I would climb
into the telescope, wiggling

my way through the labyrinth of optic organs,
tripping over gears, stumbling over glass
and I would crawl for miles

until I reached the very end of our galaxy,
standing on the very edge of it,
leaning out to where you hovered
just above and just below
light-years of space.
I would behold you.
Long to press into you.

I would then remove my space suit—first the helmet
so I could see you better—then unzip my suit
so you could see the deep, earthy matter of my heart—

then I would take off my gloves
so, with the tip of my finger I could touch you
and then, finally, I would remove

everything else
and push off—
and float into the very center of your beauty.

And it would burn
a little at first,
because beauty always does.