I fall in love
too easy
with phantoms and projections,
spectral imprints
that pool twilight
in their arms
for a living.
Where people are not,
I find myself digging
and searching,
clawing profusely
at beautiful stones
until my nails are broken
and my fingerprints bloodied
into a glyphic makeover.
I court absences,
their staggering volume
a powerful gulfstream
by which every paper boat
and child’s dream
I cast
cuts through channels
and tributaries
en route to the sea’s
brute promise of amnesia.
I forget where I am,
who I was,
and that, at heart,
I am simply
the long-lost lover
of ancient print
in a storybook
whose tales are
as old
as they are
unwritten.