June 2007, Before Leaving
You drove to my house in your first car,
parked a few blocks away—
we shared the sun, the lips of leaves
reaching over us.
I remember the layered shadows
of your eyelashes, bent over the soft bed of skin
next to your nose—I wanted to curl
up in that darkness and rest.
I ask your mother if you’ve gone.
It has taken us three years to grow
enough sincerity in which we cast
this mold for brass tongues we use to say
goodbye—I am sorry.
The smell of the backseat inhabits me—
my bones become the scent of us,
my breath is leather and stale smoke.
This apology fits your western
mountain cavity; I nestled part
of past and soul beneath
the rocks of your desert road.
Your mother says no,
and I send unwritten letters—
dry paper from that summer,
a leaf, a picture of the view we leaned on,
a dirty shoelace,
a pebble from the wall we sat against.
