As I walk past the sex store downtown, I think
of flags, how the zealots strap them on and
screw us. I am not interested in the fire
of your want, unless you want to stop
this world from burning, unless you want
to topple the men from their mountains
of heads, their slot machine eyes spinning and
spinning and spinning. No, this is not a love
poem. I will not crawl through the trenches
of your longing. You can sob all you want,
and still, the icebergs cry harder. No one
ever told them that sadness makes you
disappear. The truth is, I simply couldn’t
do it. How could I write about love at a time
like this? But I guess, I did love the idea
of us, once. A daring species. A people made
of poetry. The way I used to run after stray
kindness. My delight when I reached out
to compassion, and felt it grab me back. The time
a stranger held my hand at a department store,
enclosing my fingers in hers like they were tiny
tender petals. Or when we all lay on the ground,
six of us, like landed seals, trying to coax that
cat from out beneath the streetcar. How funny
is this life, that once the cat was rescued, we
all stood up, dusted snow from our coats and
