Fidelity

The man I love spends his time in locked rooms, turning papers and drawing new days. He is pleasant and sad and I am a sash undone.

Just now I went out through the streets of this city and came to a house where a woman stood in a window dropping ice from a pitcher onto the grass. It is easy to hold this woman in my mind and the ice in the grass and to hold you still in a room turning papers. There is no knowledge that can interrupt what is quiet and decided in me. I kneel easy and mute beneath divine affection. I crawl contented under threat.

The man I love belongs to whatever is fine and charming and defeated. He belongs to the state of Wyoming and to the golden band on my wrist. When I wet my hands he is not by my side, when I wait by the phone he does not call. It is enough to know the angels by name and to read of great loves in books. I understand this well. I too was once a child in the arms of women.