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For JLA

Here I am again,
   on the mosaic listening to heroin-fuelled jazz
& as I think of you,
             In Absentia,
I become aware of these
minor pleasures of living:
  these simple things
that rouse me from my bed each day.

The threemonthmark
          Was
so different from the Sixth.

             Yes?

As I have disregarded my need
   to prove myself
  I can say “Hello Hello”
without wearing my armor.

      In Absentia,
             You remain.
& recall the time I watched the same Pacific
     where we’d once gathered sand
Some November
& sat above on the cliff,
over the channel at Depoe Bay
Steaming from the water.

Then did I rinse you from my Judgment
             in July?
   beneath the ominous sky
that frightened me.

& Yet –
              the indelible
                                    stain
remains,
   as was proven two evenings ago…
& Sixmonths is not enough??

I wish I wish I wish
  And I remain surprised
        That still,
    I wish I wish I wish –
& do I see that there is some part of you
that is the same?

But-
Ancestry is inescapable and it runs its course,
            Right?
And
   can it confuse
            what is desired
                        with what is thought to be desired?
& even still,
nothing needs to be proven,
   but it sometimes feels like it should…

I’ll show you I’ll show you I’ll show you
                        What?
What,
if In Absentia,
  I remain you remain
            We remain,
Then there’s really no distance
    Anymore.

Right?


© 2001 Timothy Vincent Delaney
13 November 2001
Portland, Oregon