Here or in front you lean on your back

i trace the outline of your jacket strings

from an imaginary point beneath the window.

i imagine you heaving and preoccupied

with a distant sadness only your ex-wife

could explain herself, when the time comes.

even in this frosted feeling i burst

like powdered embers softly collected,

heated, burned, inflamed, microwaved.

Your scent fills this shady room

like delivery in a foil take out, the smell of sunlight

mixed with skin diffusing into the corridors

and nondescript firescapes, narrow platforms.

it is you i don't want, it is you i want to avoid.

we aren't in this together. for my sake,

i challenge this game, this agonizing wait,

this faint outline brushing against my face,

against the ghost i see where you now stand.

here or at your back i lean faceforward

to see what else lies in your hair, your uncanny

resemblance to a warning sign. your avoidance.

i suppress this tendency to burst into song

like a ripe hiccup or a stale joke. a madrigal.