Some time when the river is ice ask me mistakes I have made. Ask me whether what I have done is my life. Others have come in their slow way into my thought, and some have tried to help or to hurt: ask me what difference their strongest love or hate has made.

I will listen to what you say. You and I can turn and look at the silent river and wait. We know the current is there, hidden; and there are comings and goings from miles away that hold the stillness exactly before us. What the river says, that is what I say.

They say the ice will hold so there I go, forced to believe them by my act of trusting people, stepping out on it,

and naturally it gaps open and I, forced to carry on coolly by my act of being imperturbable, slide erectly into the water wearing my captain's helmet, waving to the shore with a sad smile, "Goodbye my darlings, goodbye dear one," as the ice meets again over my head with a click

I want to erase your footprints from my walls. Each pillow is thick with your reasons. Omens

fill the sidewalk below my window: a woman in a party hat, clinging to a tin-foil balloon. Shadows

creep slowly across the tar, someone yells, "Stop!" and I close my eyes. I can't watch

as this town slowly empties, leaving me strung between bon-voyages, like so many clothes on a line, the white handkerchief

stuck in my throat. You know the way Jesus

rips open his shirt to show us his heart, all flaming and thorny, the way he points to it. I'm afraid

the way I'll miss you will be this obvious.

I have a friend who everyone warns me is dangerous, he hides bloody images of Jesus around my house, for me to find

when I come home; Jesus behind the cupboard door, Jesus tucked

into the mirror. He wants to save me but we disagree from what. My version of hell is someone ripping open his shirt

and saying, Look what I did for you. . .