a buried child
comes unearthed

a zero sum
a gaping hole

there all along
one step ahead

and fallen into
midsentence

he imagined her naked
in his big bed at night

We touch each other’s arms often
To console ourselves. We repeat
The dialogue that we memorize.

I am everyone’s receptacle of secrets.
Hallow as a gilded reliquary,
I hold each lie and confession.

It is cold but I know how to be
Even colder. I have had centuries 
Of practice. Listen to me: I have

Bed warming, I lie open and exact
As a needle preparing to suture.

It surprises me how quickly I can conjure
You before me, more familiar to myself
Than my own mirrored face. You sit

All I am stops here.
My nose is my farthest outpost.

Fat Russian novels are sinking
like grandmothers into the snow,

My mind long gone, having forgot to shut the body
             off, I will lie in some spare room,
some former nursery, entranced by waiting for death

Heathrow could not touch things. 
They always shied away from him.

He was magnetic, but in the anti-sense of the word.