SIX OF ONE,
half a dozen of the almond biscotti, the cappuccino
steaming. Love demands good food and some small
crime against the sensible. It says this morning
we are not poor, this morning is a cul-de-sac
off the main drag. The sun rising burns the harbor
open, ignites the gulls to feeding; one long thin cry pierces
another; off-shore wind bends sound so sharply
it meets itself coming and going, tangle of sound and
blown-away ravel of night's knots into morning.
I tell him I stayed awake but not
that I spent those hours in orbit around his sleep like some
derelict planet, careening toward his dark side,
never catching up. From orbit we've seen the terminator
travel like rain on the prairie: wall of sunlight
whose top is lost in heaven,
whose clean hard edge advancing
ruffles no leaf and translates
being into being. What did you
dream? I ask, and he says
I was with him all night,
that he dreamed what was real,
all that I wanted to hear.
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