Apology #2

Dear V,

To them I’m Houdini–a miracle of poise and
control–inexplicable, enviable. Or else I’m
Dickinson, so much genius bundled, overflowing,
yet unable to go out for a walk. Two dark eyes
constantly scanning but never settling.

With you, things were different. They told us
to marry, to hang on to each other. Everything
in the world pointed to you,
or to me. The gravity between us
like a settling stone. And then the rift

twelve months at least of an unbearable
lightness. Of being separated, I thought
you would wash it away with “fuck it”s
or “shit”s, but between our rocks
you thought a bridge might look better.

Never mind that I was the one throwing
the rope…. You decided to catch it,
to wrap yourself up in it, and to stand there,
unwavering, as I set to weaving these things
back together.

Never mind that I finally broke the silence–
when I was shaky and uncertain, you were
coming in from the cold, eyes set ahead,
beaming.

Apology #1

Dear E,
It was a consequence of bad timing, I am left to assume
that everything fell apart. In a world of cheap jetfuel and
the history channel, so many young ones cannot help
but be drawn to you. This was supposed to be personal.

Now, I think of you only in the dusty pages of my first books.
It is the way I would like to remember you, a weathered look on your face,
sand-strewn eyes, a life of riddles with buried answers. Forgive me
for giving up; it is all I could bear to give.