Classic Poem

We used to meet
on this corner
in the same wind.
It fought us up the hill
to your house,
blew us in the door.
The elevator rose
on guests of stale air
fed on ancient dinners.
Your room smelled
of roach spray and roses.

In those days
we went to bed with Marvell.
The wind ruffled sheets and pages,
spoke to us through walls.
For hours I used to lie
with my ear to your bare chest,
listening for the sea.

Now the wind is tearing
the building down.
The sheets are rising.

They billow through the air like sails.

White with your semen
holding invisible prints
of the people we were,
the people we might have been,
they said across the country
disguised as clouds.

Momentarily they snag
on the Rocky Mountains,
then rise
shredded into streamers.

Now they are bannering westward
over California
where your existence
is rumored.