haunts the best loved,
half the true body
missing most of the time.
The way we walk
alone, molding the air
before us, cradling each other
in our empty arms.

2

How deeply can you search
a wound, and still call it healing?
Making love, we say. As if
we could take it in our hands
and craft it, lovingly, the way a potter
tastes the clay for salts, runs wet hands
along a rim. And isn't the beauty
most in the flaws, in the bend
of the bowl's resistance?
Which is why
I want to understand
your story,

3

which is why I want you
to hear mine. Listen:
against the white wall, a spray
of small exotic lilies, bought
to fill the space where you
are not, casts a Zen silhouette.
I couldn't have arranged them
like that. Do you see? How carefully
they cup their shadows?
How quietly
they heal the air
they pierce.