Sunday, February 13, 2011

Our Valentine and First Year


We have decided the third Friday in March
rather than the nineteenth, this year the eighteenth.
And a year past, he sails
from January through our day
our year marker, our race time's first split.
Missing, of all the holidays, the two
concerned with love alone.

Here I am couched on February thirteenth
reading love poems selected by Peter Washington,
and he, in Cuba, waits for evening to call.

Tonight we'll discuss new books and retirement investments,
red pandas, brown bears, and manatees.
These are perhaps our most romantic talks of the year.
With finite minutes coming to their end,
"you have one minute remaining"
a brisk-voiced woman says over our line.
"Let's just say 'I love you' until it hangs up," he says.
I got the final word, in a near shout.
click.
and laughter.

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Commuter Poetry


Poetry is available during the homeward commute.

Perhaps it is that I, motion-sick, lean
the corner of my forehead against the curve
of the train windowpane;
could be the electricity from the third rail
whirring through the car's body,
whispering in between clumsy lurches.
The hard plastic wall digs into my head,
compelling me to readjust
(I must write this down)
and it is lost.