Ode On The Things My Last Lover Left Behind Him
I have never met nor had such a man for scattering himself
Through someone else's life.
It is the usual collection of odds and
Ends;
Medecine, lovenotes, angry words, and clothing
Things left with the expectation of reunion and return
Revisiting in this cold and foreign city.
Half-resentfully I cling and hoard these rags and relics.
I don't know why.
When they are gone, once I have sent them back or out or away,
the relationship will be Officially Over.
Even in the seven shaded grey and shadowed back-of-my-mind.
This is surely why his things still linger in corners, and yet
The minute I stepped across the boundary
And put the distance of three states between us,
it should have been clear that even the currencies of comfort and illness
Would not be enough to buy me back again.