Electric

It’s a calm night. The kind of calm inside which,hours after having entered another’s body with your ownbody, you wonder Did that happen, any of it, and then the staggering awayhome from it, as from a crime scene, or the grottoed site of somemiracle believed in by enough pilgrims to make it seemalmost true? . . . It’s as if the calm

contains the night, which containsthe fears that only exist, finally, insideyou. Each fear being different, each containsits own dream—is dream the word? Vision, maybe? Except invisible,the way certain gestures are, the gesture of sorrow when it shifts, the waya storm shifts, to something easier to bear

than sorrow. A hawk tearing not so slowly at a smaller bird that’sstill breathing. A man thinking that by withdrawing from the conversation,he’s taken control of the conversation. I’ve known more than a few menlike that. Sex in colors. Names like Believe me or don’t, whatever. Tattoos likeDangerous. And Don’t disturb. And It’s a long life,if you’re lucky. And You were right

all along: It was love. And I wish you more time. And When they mostneeded bandaging, he covered my eyes. The skin of his hands. Like deerskin.