- The Identity Thief
From you I make a purer form of you—unencumbered by blood flow,memory bleached clean as a set of excavated teeth. When creditors call you in the evening's late hours, tell themyou've lifted airily out of your sneakers, unspooling passwordsthrough phone cords and birds' hollow bones. She's freer, she's freer, this new self whisked like a suit to the dry cleaner—though I'll admitthat I slipped into her sleeves. Together we've seen bad movies in far away cities, felt sunrises warm our near-perfect croissants. I almost sentyou a postcard but founda new lover before writing my "Wish you were here."
Know this: I never owned anything [End Page 36] more than your absence, that unspokenreassurance that you'll not pass yourself while crossing the street.See these faces, full now with fall's attenuated windchill,each one ready for work, or sex, or sleep's long reward.See them step into restaurants or make wayfor their neighbors, warm in the knowledge that so many unknowable persons build livesproximate to their own. Now imagine that one of them shares your name.I am in the business of elaborate public service.I robbed you of no more than isolation's charm. We've all kept it in surplus, our lives equal parts digitized and adrift.Empathy is what I've given you, gratis. I'll take anger in exchange for my grift. [End Page 37]