You know, those heels, the ones a bit too high
and certainly uncomfortable, but luck and common
sense are stuck in the back of your carry-on bag.
And yes, there is a larger moon, and then one
even larger, one perched up next to landscape,
so forget the camera, don’t breathe or wobble,
your words held still, and still uncooperative
in every setting that you try. Those pearls
your mother used to sleep with, all perfect
round wishes, a mix of aspiration and thin-
pillow induced insomnia. Implication is defined
as meeting a stranger while having coffee
in an airport lounge and wondering if he’s
decaffeinated, or how much tequila
it might take to make the bottom swoon.
These many different lakes recount
the strength of anniversary, the steak
that you spring for, the dessert you know
won’t do. Unpeel every advertisement
in well-worn magazines, discard each promise
as so outdated there’s no way it’s going to fit.
There’s just no way it’s going anywhere,
while you are birds in setting sunlight, you
inhabit mail-in offers, stuff postcards
in the empty seat beside. Past this early morning
leaving, the BBC whispered news and told you,
you were awake. Mixed-up innuendo and regrets
in practicing goodbyes until even the place
you still reside is sort of a demonstration
of wishful thinking. Or a map no one
could ever count on, your squishing
fingertips wandering together to measure scale
and then, shit, you must have flinched.
Each tip unsteady in your attempts to prepare
for the weather in your suitcase. Situations,
the ones where rain and sun combine
into a note that you leave for the cat, a small
prayer there in the bottom of the bowl, before
double-checking deadbolt and whispering goodbye.