That next morning after the three-bottle night
we were supposed to leave together.
I was primed for you,
your mended cotton sweater soft beside
my black jacket with the loose buckles,
your need for unruled paper, solitude.
The slippery bus bench.
I’d packed my passport, left a pillow
pummeled to my head’s shape under the blanket.
Then your mind changed.
Someone said they’d seen you, looking blurred
on the beach at Naxos, your feet scuffling broken shells.
I stared my eyelids stiff at a pile of dark blue ironing
set up the board, and practiced leaving first.
Later, I trailed you to a city you had loved, city of blue stone.
Of what use was that colour?
I took your old job, dishwasher, and waited to be more like you.
Overnight in the watery hostel
the resident drunk woke me, pushing
his wet hand
A voice from my throat shook him from the mattress.
In the morning he brought a pale egg
scrambled on a paper plate. Entreated me not to tell.
Silence was my trait already, but for years
the next girl troubled me.
What would she do, jarred awake in the dark?
