Who knows.

You're so mechanical;
I'm the smoke curling in your hair,
withering and disappearing when all I want to do is stay.

What I wouldn't give to be the spiderwebs on your skin;
you'll never know,
I swallow the words before I say them,
taking them like pills,
they sit in my chest threatening to break my ribs.

You're all black.
You're all white.
You're the extremes and I'm the haze clinging to the edges.
I move like the surf, advancing and retreating,
you'll never know,
I long to live in the tidepools.

I'm your cigarette's ash,
darting with a blow.
I hold onto your shirt, your shoes;
I grow, and grow,
the black spots on your lungs that you haven't seen.
This is the only way I can be you.

So you breathe me in without knowing.
The salt you taste is the sweat of my skin.