I’ve known
several women with the same simple name,
but this morning she’s the one who came
to mind.
I whispered it softly –
her name – just once
(I wouldn’t repeat it),
and you didn’t –
you couldn’t – know
the same name held clinging
*****-blond curls,
the interrupted curve of a bitten lip,
the upturned twitch of a switched-on nose,
a sparking flame at the center of midnight eyes.
Did I make it all up,
what I saw
when I whispered
this same name...
what I saw
when I whispered it,
your name,
just once?