dummy

Its aftereffects:
silver hand-mirror and turquoise comb,
antique dresser and peeling wall.
                                                 Through east window
our tenement-space: blinds light-creaked,
dew on some outer pane vap’ring like dust.

The building: derelict of grand hotel—
Parisian, gargoyle-decked,
lauds already singing in Huysmanic fashion…

Sunday? say Sunday.

The note should be unintelligible,
scrawled in haste:
the hand left only minutes before. (That blank sheet
with those crazy indents desire makes.)

Regarde:
“Je suis allé à la plage. Grab einkaufen gegangen. Last night, ooh,
marvelous. Soon. Soon, love.”

Clear of the pavingstones you step lightly over
down to the café: I reset my watch.

(4/2002)