Calypso in Paris

It is a hideous November—

even your
indifference

takes a blue form.

You are for the new world,
tomorrow.

I, for America, today.

Your apartment is cold
and I search your kitchen

for napkins

as you bite into
a late night animal.

You wake

to tell me
about a dream

of us eating out

someone
together.

I want to ask

but don’t.
I have given myself

seven hours of flight

to bring
my halves back

as one—

though the body is a dull metaphor,
won’t quite line up.

Part of me

has already
departed,

the other, sits

motionless,
blows ash off the windowsill

and small curls

of burning paper
descend,

doomed
for the fruit stands below.

It is a hideous November—

birds glide down the canal,
strings

of city wires

slope like hills, fluid
and tapered

by wind.

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