Smoke, Mirrors.

Sitting across from
a reflection 
at a bright 
and dingy 
mexican place.

The wood paneling
casts funny shadows,
and I want to say
I told my shrink 
about you.

Instead we smile over cokes
and read the menu board
aloud in bad accents.

I want to say
you don't exist 
to me anymore.

You are wisps
of shadow and 
steam
like the
empty red basket
on the table,
misaligned parchment,
a thin layer of grease.

You are the wedged
piece of
chip in my gums,
waiting for tacos.

I want to say
I can see 
through you,
you are not
here.

Winter Hands

Please crawl under my skin again,
burrow in,
the winter's coming.
It's time to take off
the corn and
shorn the fields
of their wheat.

Let your hair fall down
like the dry, crunching leaves,
fall into me,
please. 

Soon the days will
be short,
grey like
the sea and
the sea will be angry
with cold and exhaustion.
Your eyes
rove endlessly
in the coming time,
you see the small future

bleak on the horizon,
I beg you,
come home and I
can be a blanket.
I will open my 
arms to you,
a homemade afgan
to drape across your
thinning shoulders.

Sitting by the window
we look out over the
dull sands,
wanting to pull on
our slick wellies
and venture out.

The wind drives our door
closed,
and I hold you, with
your forlorn eyes,
against my own warm body,
hoping to pull you
back to this life,
to keep your heart
thumping softly next to mine.