Invisible

Love—

let's name it—

is not for me what it is for you.

Love, my love,

is something altogether linear—

or would be

if only I hadn't tangled the wire

if only I hadn't strung myself up

if only I hadn't strung you out

if only I hadn't hung the Polaroid of you

on the wall, and then from the moon.

My love, love, 

is Point A and Point B—

I cannot coil the useless love I have for you

into the circle that would knit

Point A (me) and Point B (you)

into kiss, kiss, reprise, finale.

Once, an endless number of days ago

two lovers lay in Washington Heights

atop Ikea sheets drenched in lilacs atop 

a bed atop a parquet floor 

(desirable, insisted the realtor).

One lover said to the other:

What if I love you more than you love me?

One lover did not say this. One lover

said nothing at all. Perhaps there was

a smile as fleeting as the soiled August

breeze leaving its sooty prints on our sill.

Do you remember who you were,

which lover?

Do you remember any of it?

Now, I am the din outside that once-window,

I am buses and cars and schoolchildren and

bodegas and basketballs and babies.

In other words, my love,

I am just out there, of no particular consequence

to you, just the noise of your periphery.

And everyone knows

you cannot see noise.