afternoons when you came
back to me,
your arms aching for me,
though they smelled
of other women
and your sweet head bowed
for me to rub
and your heart bursting
with things to tell me,
and your hair
and your eyes
wild.
We would embrace
on the carpet
and leave
the imprint of our bodies
on the floor.
My back is still sore
where you pressed me
into the rug,
a sweet soreness I would never
lose.
I think of you always
on Sunday afternoons,
and I try to conjure you
with these words
as if you might
come back to me
at twilight
but you are never coming back
never.
The truth is
you no longer exist.
Oh you walk the world
sturdily enough:
one foot in front
of the other.
But the lover you were,
the tender shoot
springing within me,
trusting me with your dreams,
has hardened
into fear and cynicism.
Betrayal does that
betrays the betrayer.
I want to hate you
and I cannot.
But I cannot
love you either.
It is our old love
I love,
as one loves
certain images
from childhood
shards
shining in
the street
in the shit.
Shards of light
in the darkness.