Luggage
I carry your love around
like a piece of luggage.
At the airport, it costs
twenty-five dollars to check it in.
I sit on the plane, and doze off
knowing it is safe, below.
When I get off the plane,
I pick it up again.
It is still intact.
But it feels lighter now—
had one of the carriers mangled it?
Did the flight attendant remove
something from it?
I shrug and walk on.
I carry it into my hotel room
and unpack it on the bed.
Skirts and shoes,
they are all here.
I lie down, put my feet up
look around and find
something is missing.
The Figure in Your Photographs
The figure in your photographs
is always walking away, so one can
only see the back. Or it appears as a small
dot, almost like an afterthought, in the center
of an exotic beach bathed in light.
Both of these facts make the figure appear
sexless—tall, lanky, broad shoulders, cropped hair.
Of course the figure is important,
to you or to the art, else you would shoot it apart.
I like to think of the figure
as a random person who stopped so perfectly,
perhaps a stranger, or a child,
or a woman who stole your heart.