I take the soft earlobe of the mirror between my teeth, whisper here’s breath, lost fog cluttering the glass ear like a prayer. I want to write something down in it. Beg for it and watch it disappear. The way we need each other. Ask things like against what does never shatter. Do you remember when endlessness slipped off the chant of the sea like a shredded gown and stepped into me like a ghost through the wall? If you don’t believe me, put your ear in my mouth like it’s an empty shell and listen. Let the planes explode heavenward until we learn to love  the sky’s preference for silence. When a friend died I looked up and said you’ll need the rest of us if you want to stay named  heaven. So why don’t we let wishes chew up all the star that’s left. Let the boardwalk stay driftwood for the rest of these from now on days, ever since the inevitable spit it out like broken gold teeth. And let the salt air kiss the Ferris wheel to sleep as it kneels down like a broken horse in the hush of Jersey surf. Let one more suicide empty the beach so quickly the dark goes right on singing without you. Let the casino lights down south keep right on banging on the door of sky and darken, shine and shine let go, flicker like if only, if only. You need a chapel of bone for an echo like that to come home to. I need you like money, love, more when you’re gone and I’m alone. Most when it’s so late it’s early and so far into Ohio. When you stride through me the way a child’s hand trails through tips of bent grass like a ribbon. The way the past moves through us like a drive through movie we glimpse only from the interstate. When your twinkling house keys snow the unsaid like most last words into my open hands.