Sunsets and Cenotes

Fire was in the air, tonight,
but not the kind that burns.

Orange, a touch of pink,
gold kissing the edges
of clouds, slow drifting,

a man taking photos
on his phone, apparently
founder of a Facebook group
for sunsets in Franklin County.

I wasn’t holding his or any motive
as I stood looking at the sky—
aside from

wondering
what it looked like—
what it felt like—

where you are.            

            ***

I imagine you
on a deck, gazing up,
thinking, dreaming,

watching
the sky
as it toasts
the clouds.

There is water
and earth–there
in those eyes.

Inside of—
all over—
my mind:
Cenote Gold.

And I wonder
how the Mayans believed
anything but heaven
hid behind

those
pools.

               *** 

Xibalba looms
and ancient
myths and evils

give no quarry
to what ends
no hope
of the other side

but I take
tentative peace
where I am—
where I stand—

trusting the elements,
drifting in sunsets

that promise of
the dawn.  

***   ***  ***
 

Declarations
                       
                – memories in Lisbon, 2013

I am not in love with you
            but the idea of you—
the possibilities reared in your voice— 
           shimmer, like light
                        and water,

your eyes,
            like cenotes, lost
            & filled with molten
                        muddied gold.

I am not in love with you,
            
           but it would be so easy
 
                                             to fall.  

            ***  ***  ***


Un-Turning the Page

             — italicized phrases from Cyril Wong’s “Literature”

 
I’ve been googling
                                  (what the good guy
                                             calls stalking)

and I like
when you said, “it’s a marathon,
not a sprint”

predictive hint, not just
because of this (I knew that you ran), but
hearing you speak (outside of this)
was like seeing you (beyond this)
standing close enough to know
the scent before the rain.

                                          You say,
we can be
immortal, but you feel
so far away.  And it’s so hard to say
three more days is not
enough.

                You nod.  And I’m watching
the page of your face
as it’s turning; and underneath, another page
rising, til the silence itself is deafening,
and I am that
                         darker realization:

June’s thirty is caesura
to this we’ve been
doing.

             Cenote Gold is too distracting,
so I look past you, now, to those saplings,
behind and to the side, feet in snow,
roots stretching, enwrapping
something akin to
growth.

                         And I wonder what
your voice sounds like.  I wonder
if it’s breaking.  I wonder
what you’re writing

in the eleven months
before we meet

again.