POEM OF THE WEEK
3/20/99

---

The Polar Ice Caps
for Cory

 

 

It's never simple

 

to tell someone

whose lips you've tasted

 

there was a moment

there

like a snapshot

 

a blinding

flashbulb

 

crackling gray

electric smoke

 

Never simple

to say that

 

or this

 

when

i love you

isn't earned and

 

i want you

seems like a

cheap watch

with a dead

battery

 

an old ugly

show piece of

costume jewelry

 

nor dare one

mention

ice blue eyes

for fear of

drowning in a

pool of tired

cliché

 

So

what is left

then

 

With this problem?

This

 

complicated problem

between

yes and no

 

friends and

love

 

old and young

 

and

what is the

math

or the

poem

or the

anything

 

that lives

in the

hungry place

 

except

lingering glances

between one

and the other

 

making two

uncomfortable lovers

 

one on this end

of the world

and one

on

that.