#39

Dream-image, you, in the white of winter-time, reticent with tea. My father, as ever, absent. The margins of our past: no currency, no will to straighten the oblique nor reason forth the sun. The unreal, I've read, cannot be counted. And you, stirring your spoon in pale distraction, your face freckled and still, have never been divided. Oh, that home we shared from which the cold would not disperse, those rooms with slanted floor where you tossed, and stitched, and crawled with cats in angles. This dream-you who follows your lead and remains seated across like a language - remember, Jennie, remember?

Here, where absence will not compromise, the days conspire toward your vanishing. You too have found the exit: history ending like a lease expired. The time remaining as tangible as snow. And so I have clasped you to my heart (coupled twins to my longing extended). Left yourself shadows that wander and graze in the text of poets, the doors that they open to houses washed with vinegar. Remember, Jennie, remember. Each word, like a letter, reads itself aloud.