A Desert Night
We want to be stranded in the desert
with no keys back to our house, our eyes
big and curtained, our hands
freezing, our position in the world
immobile. We want each other,
to be situated in the salad of life, green
and remembered by all. You tell me living
is no reward for the way things are. I agree.
Night comes starless and cold, a chorus
of indictments. I’ve done everything wrong.
I’ve lived up to my paunch in lies without convictions
of my own. Now I am the puppet of others’ opinions,
my strings tied to the body politic. I can’t think
of the last time I made a decision, everything someone
else’s fault. Memory is a gnat I can’t flick away.
I did not choose my height or my intellect or even
my will.
Where can I go if I crawl on my belly? Distance
elapses between us. White lines on the highway
flash before us in the sudden wake of my guilt.
This is all the way we planned it. The land
is broken at our feet. I can’t confront the way
I feel, the way I look away from strangers’ gazes.
I want to stare at those who make accusations,
who gun me down with their words.
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