The Longing We Save

In an actors’ game
we wandered the stage
blindfolded,
allowed our fingers to explore
the first face we met.

I knew instantly the pale soft eyelids
the coils of hair around his ears
whiskers about to break.

I kept my hands on his face
for a very long time
and later in front of whole troupe
said I knew him because he was the only one who needed a shave.

By the time he drowned
I'd forgotten all about him.
"A promising young designer"
they said. "A tragedy".


Yesterday I heard of logs
lost
on their way to a mill
somewhere in the states,
Pennsylvania or Nebraska,
and how they've rested
under the water
for a hundred years.

What rare value
absence gives.

Men and machines are working
round the clock
to salvage them.
But I imagine
the logs rising slowly
on their own
one by one.


And I think of Peter again,
the lovely longing we save
for things taken from us,
his memory
floating back,
and how in a moment
like this one
even the dead seem ready
to break
through.