That afternoon, while you placed large rocks in the garden,
I painted my toenails sienna.
When the sun neared the trees, we were
in the kitchen
in your house
on the Big Island,
Hawaii.
I sat on the counter, my legs dangling.
You stood leaning near.
We were too distracted to make love again,
so we talked about the trees
we saw the day before on Maui.
Dusk etched the jagged silhouette of the backyard
banana trees into the approaching night.
You talked about the palm tree
palms up, feathered fronds, fingers spread
shading their hard seed fruit.
You talked about the banyan tree
a forest of one. Flourishing. Spreading
an acre of root web.
You spoke of these trees.
Man tree.
Woman tree
Your words
kissed the air.
I felt a poem growing inside me,
but I did not write it.
I saved the feeling in my skin, and I
did not tell you at that moment
how much I knew about love, and at
that moment how much I loved you in that moment.
Silence. Fertility. Intimacy.
On that island, so new so new it looks old.
Monochromatic. Scraggy desolation metamorphosis.
On that island, so new so new
it recasts itself with rivulets of lava.
On that island where Pele’s hair is smooth and shiny stone
Black decorated with hardened cells of sponge.
On that island, The Big Island, voices call you.
Voices I see, but do not hear.
Magnetic mystery.
On that island.
There on that island.
There on the Kona Coast where you want to rest.
There where your legs grow tan and taut.
There you want to count the rest of your days.
There more miles away than the number of days we’ve spent together.
There she calls you she calls she calls.
Rustling wind. Withering warm. Distant.
Another morning, on another day, for a moment, I believe
you do not love me enough to bend and stay.
You cannot hear Manhattan.
It’s lost its voodoo juju.
But, it beats life my life.
My life is here.
Here in New Jersey.
Here in New York.
Here with my cats.
Here with my friends.
Here with my family.
Here with my winter clothes.
Here where I don’t tell time by changing shadows.
Here in y life with my life be in my life.
I hear us talk around the sound of your leaving.
I dream that Waikoloa is your mistress, not me.
I try not to trace the lines on your hands.
For that moment, in that morning, I forget
Vines twine unbroken around the trellis.
I forget we are building fences, not fortresses.
Later, we shower together.
You hand me the shampoo and I remember
we slept through the night together.
While you shave,
I get a box of cereal from the pantry shelf.
I wonder, when Eve left Eden,
did she know it was paradise?
I might leave the Garden State.
Ruth roamed with Naomi.
Wither thou goest take us with you.
ani li dodi… I am my beloved’s my beloved is mine…
Anything could happen.
I watch you stand in the Bronx, in your other kitchen,
Cooking breakfast looking out over the river.
We both like to eat.
There will be many more meals than miles.