El Olvido

Ya no la quiero, es cierto, pero tal vez la quiero.
Es tan corto el amor, y es tan largo el olvido.
- Neruda


Angel, she was the one.

The one who stood on the curb and cried
because she wanted me to leave and not leave.
and three hours later when I crossed the Hudson,
golden in the afternoon sun, I still could've turned
around and gone back

and told her I loved her and it can work.

The one who called me when I was
out of range somewhere in southwestern Kansas,
across the Panhandle and in some twenty dollar
New Mexico motel. The one who-. After wheat fields
graded into hard boulders,

deserts and a gas station in Ocotillo,
then standing two miles from the opposite sea,

I would have turned around.

[ca. May 05]