You Try to Write an American Love Poem

[9]

Instead, from the passenger seat, you watch a herd of deer for the first time. On the rain-speckled window, their faces are smooth sea-soaked pebbles.

[2]

At the thrift store, Ben buys a wooden flask, a scarf and a painting of two cats. They are grey and caught in each other’s neck. Outside, Jake buys boba and ducks his head when he gets in the car. Ben and you are talking about this and that–

[4]

Ben and you talk about learning how to drive. Jake offers you his drink. You have borrowed his drinks before. They taste pink.

[5]

At their home, Ben takes an hour deciding wall for the newly acquired. Jake and you are sitting on a chair and he’s gently swaying it. At dinner, he brushes sugar off your face. Ben and you laugh as you watch Seinfeld. Later, Jake offers to drive you home. You ask Jake to drive you home. Jake drives you home.

[7]

You invite him in. Songs pour into the hissing can of diet coke. He confesses being a Bright Eyes kid and kisses you on the cheek. Outside, you notice the beginning of silence. Soon you will watch your first snow.

[3]

academic circle

grief

the frailty of days

the consequence
of desire
is an unmaking of self

to want something
is to embody the possibility
of not having

[6]

By the sinewy dusk of the parking lot, he insists there’s more to it. He will be in New York or Boston. And don’t you plan on returning to India? Your voice is brief in its yes. Jake rests his head on the steering wheel. You long to gather the day’s last flight of birdcalls.

[8]

Months later, you buy separate tickets. The evening before, you dye each other’s hair. Ben’s cats are still tangled. Jake brushes bleach and dabs pink and blue. He washes your hair in the kitchen sink, says sorry I have never touched a non-white person’s hair – and – tell me if I hurt you. You nod. You sing a Bengali love- chorus. You want to tell him about the boat. The girl embroidered on the quilt. She can take you along. She can take both of you along.

[1]

In the liquid of the bathtub, you wash the brown of your limbs and imagine the rise and fall of his body on yours.