Love, in the slip of a dress sleeve.
In the mauve neckline that stays,
the crescent imprint
on a wine-stained napkin.
Intimacy only lives
outside of the body.
Perhaps there is a romance
in the world without me; an afterthought
I instantly regret, but often wonder.
The first kiss still feels like an ending
& the city goes on. Always,
rain. Old light. The unforgiving
memory. Just once,
to live idly. To sell myself absence.
To dream only of what we can touch.
Love, in the poem I do not write,
but still wait for. & then listen
to its slow breathing, the gentle wake
of a morning in the late February sun,
yes, you remind me of honey. & yellow silk.
How we feel in waves & want language
to be more tender. Even then,
the silent reckoning of things.
The dull space between my life
& your life, as they briefly spill
into each other, an illusion of
nearness. That familiar song,
in which the world passes
& we all think: never again.
