Goodbye
Strange how attention feeds hope
In turn, leading to disappointment
The bloom before the fall
When that which is given is taken away
Knowingness, effusive, if only for a second
A willful entering, leaving loss in its wake
Breaking earth like an excavation
Rooting for the truth
Less time for this feigned ignoring
A slight of eye, a trick to myself
But never ignorant,
For I feel your finger on the pulse
And I imagine the taste of you
The stripped down feel of you
My mind on the cusp of sleep, unguarded
Will you make me face my sadness again?
In the quiet moments, in the private spaces
There you are, like me
It thrums within us now, a life of its own
A parallel dimension of possibilities
Lived out, in sweet mundaneness, an invisible stream
Of real life zigs and zags, eraser mark marred
Not the hip perfection of the wispy mendacities
Twirling inside my head
And I could not help but notice
The gentle favor of your words about nothing
Fixed in memory, the way you say my name
A lingering I catch my breath to extend, though not for long
The hold between us, as if encountering a skittish animal in the wild
A reprieve lasting about as long
For hope is a brutal mistress,
Goodbye, and goodbye, and goodbye…