4.22.2013

he needed her to be there in order to make her gone

Cleopatra Mathis, from Book of Dog: Poems--

When She Spoke, He Closed His Eyes

So she tried to disappear, obliged 
by his own disappearing, becoming
who she wasn't. Not there was not
who she was, and not how she was.
She could tiptoe out, he could be
relieved or (surprise!) come searching.
But how would that work
when he needed her to be there
in order to make her gone, disappeared
into other. What other? she thought, wondering
how to make herself into someone
absent, so she could be the one
he would welcome, wide-eyed, wanting
to hear whatever it was she had to say.

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