There's always a reason to quit. Your silences
pour over the house like oil while my anger
snakes like a downed power line.
And there's always a reason
to wait: I'm machine-gunned by doubt.
The pleats around your eyes
are beautiful enough to renew
all my promises. I anguish over your
calf muscles, your perfect pie crust,
the out-of-print books you seem to find
as easily as pennies on the street
just in time for my birthday. I've lost my way before,
darling, though never so committedly. Happiness
is more delicate than the angle where the iris
meets the lens, and the things I shouldn't have felt
have carried me farther than I ever imagined.
I'm tired of the windstorms uprooting
all the trees. I know that if I expect you to hear it,
then whatever I say must be plain as a pine box
so here it is: my desires are like teeth
that won't align. Lovers must die or part.
It happens all the time.