What you said was

how nice would be the morning
after we’d slept
and awoke to find it fall
leaves would have turned
and I’d be in love with you.
orange and yellow
hanging from trees
you’d sit up and smile
and I’d be in love with you.

As she sleeps I wish she could
love me like books. And she does and loves me like
hell and desperation in her dreams
but when she wakes up I can’t meet
her expectations. She just gets up
and puts the books on the shelf, tucking
them in gently like she’s making
her bed. She lives on the other side of the
library; she lives for books and dreams
for me.

–Fall 1986