SENDINGS

 

             To M (after your engagement)

 

I wrote you a postcard, but I think

I lost it   Or I lost your address or you moved and did you tell me that

or did you tell someone else

Perhaps you notified a different

me in a different city

 

As far as our past, did you tell me or did I

tell you    We danced together as teenagers, the length

of one song   Even before our years, this happened

And this card    it was something

I drew myself (I think), the crayoned

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outlines of a mountain, a lake,

or a rocky outcrop along a highway

In it, I told you about this summer, how I touched a tree

Branches and bark over 3,200 years old

when it died   I had to look up the exact number so that

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I could tell you     I also mentioned new cities

we never went together

How I saw broken ceramic in holy blue, mosaics set

right in the sidewalk     I told you I don’t even have to

explain what that meant     Did you know, I can’t remember

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dancing     Fifteen years ago; I try and

try to see myself in that gym

the jewel-pink gossamer, the flower on my wrist

I try to see the faces

of the other people, of you, but everything’s

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lost a razor edge, its relative

definition     On another night, I do remember holding you in the

kitchen in Indiana, and outside the window an empty pool Its basin drained,

yet half lit by day

and so full of leaves

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BUSY & SCHEDULE & FEED

 

Everything coiled; the lists

of things & places & to

 

& there are captioned

moments, a blank. I sit in front

 

of fresh-bloom poppies, my

palms warm on a terracotta

 

path. There is a choir in this

air—how much & too much?

 

& please, this one thing, this.

There are flashes

 

& pauses; I sit in front

of a painting. In it, a sheet

 

stirred to full float, burst-lit

& free. & I’m not empty.

 

I think: light & weight &

light & light.