Things We Don't Have Words For

At Hickory Creek

The color of the creek,
the difference between green, olive
and August moss.
As we press our backs into it,
hickory bark shadows
fall around us.
Remember twenty years ago
soaking our long hair
in the cold water
after sitting all afternoon in the sun?
What do you call that?
Or the glint I remember
waiting in your left eye,
a refection of the Colman lantern
and the moth landing
on the table like a spare
and misplaced noun.

Memory is an anniversary
of sorts, like a reunion
that requires no invitation.
What about your hands
on the rhododendron boughs,
the clip of the zipper
on the old canvas tent?

I don’t have a word for this—
the feeling in my ribcage,
the heat in my palms—
but I know it’s there
like the friction between cells
that holds them together.