Savannah: night’s steam just
beginning. In our talk, stories of ex-
lovers like the ghostly hover
of bread. Rising above us,
they body forth old raptures:
your French sculptress opening
minute doors and cantilevers
into being. To free her, you merely slept --
mouth prone -- beside her.
I cried at your goodbye
to the Finnish one: an offhand
wave as the classroom door shut.
Then me: having to dream a resolution --
the old lover shows me a photo
of all his exes; like a family reunion
we name our mean aunts, the cruel
duplication of icy fathers,
our insufficiencies, a progeny
we call loss.
Hungry or not, we savor
the ghosts. Watch as they eat
the air between us.
