the width of the ocean

there is not always such depth
washing across me;

sometimes it is the lick of a
tiny wave, a student propelling herself
into my arms for the daily hug.
i am awake to her hair
on my cheek and the ache of it,
a thing i didn't recognize until
a second ago.

sometimes i watch fathers with
their babies, giant hands
touching fragile fingers, those
barely-kisses on top of
a soft head, and then it is a riptide
pulling me under, edges blurred.

that is when i understand
the width of the ocean,
the space between my arms
that suddenly feels so empty.

Inkstone

(Inkstone, n. The literary magazine of my alma mater)

i don't know how i end up
in these places.

ten years ago,
you put the second volume
in my hands, said most
writers are starving,
but the poems still tasted
like dreams (it could
be enough to fill me).

in those days, i slipped warbling
words through the mail slot,
my imagination adding
stanzas about the husband
and kids, cozy house
in the midwest.

i sleep alone in a
peeling-paint rental
in madrid where my
roommate always beats
me to the mailbox.
today: manila envelope,
inkstone inside, i'm flipping
through the bios, noticing
how we always speak
in present tense, never
sure what we'll be
once this issue is
finished.

my story is not chubby
babies and minnesota. i buy
cheap plane tickets and fall asleep
too early. i do not recognize
the names of the writers
in the back pages, all
young and ready
for life or what we
think it will be

(but i have never
forgotten the weight
of a semicolon or the
flavor of hope).