I'll Dream You

I see you standing in the doorway

I see you sitting at the keys

I once gave you a Dell laptop

I believe it was red

I see you choosing a chocolate

I see you brewing unsweet tea

I see you gathering your belongings

after a workshop you taught

I help you carry boxes & cloth bags

I see you driving down 61 toward Charleston

I see you talking to Tova

that you met Tova

that she remembers you

I see you in a yellow cotton shirt

I see you draped in a long scarf

like a chasuble

you were not that kind of religious

I hear you saying thank you to your audience for coming out

I see you writing to a prompt

you didn’t like that much

your prompts came undirected

I see pages in your journal in your hand

I never read one

your journals like Emily’s poems

unread, undetected

gone to an archive

I hope they remain unread

most of the time I don’t see or hear or think of you

except every time I say Susan

or hear a bird

what is that one, Susan? I say

I see us at the table — you, me, Blue —

eating Blue’s bog chicken

tasting field peas

I see the kitchen after his cooking

I see the photo of young Susan & young Blue

how we set out, some of us

together until we fall apart

I see you in your own mind’s eye

your hand covering the page

with what tilts & topples

& turns into magic

this is true

one of these days, I’ll dream you