Our hands clenched together
In a spontaneous dash,
We fly down the grand staircases and swirling halls
Of the Atlantis at 3 a.m.

I,
Skidding to a halt in triumph,
Push toward the wall of sleek windows
Containing the exotic creatures
Swimming swiftly and sweetly
Through the dark water of the night.

And you, my dear,
Drunk with the ancient incense
Of island air and twilight,
Nourish my curiosity with your voice.
“Go ahead.”

We approach the world of blue
And lift our faces to the glass,
Pressing coolly against the fins
Sprinkled with deep, dark gold.

Through the water I see
The scales twinkling in your eyes,
And in secret I see them return a gaze
Through the reflection of the window
Softly sprinkled with life.

Reflection of moon past twilight.
To pierce it, to disrupt,

could be a dive from high.
All chaos.

I ponder, swimming alone,
splitting the moon by my hand, scooping it, softly.

The fish must feel my tension.
Fretting madly when they can’t avoid

the ripples forming in the surrounding space, until, sick of it,
completely shaken by it, suddenly, it takes them.

Delusions about you,
My future, are both
Grandiose and frightening.
You are the ringleader
Overseeing the management
At a carnival ground.

Step up, you say to the child
As you grasp her around the waist
And lift her to a plastic pony
Twisting around the scenery.

In this spinning, if she stares
Long and hard
She can see the glorious paintings
In the swirl of colors,
But not the faces in pain,

Just the art on the walls
Growing brighter
At the sight of the sun
Sinking down into the earth,
Lighting its skies on fire.

I am selling away these board games,
The Sorries, the Troubles, and the Twisters
On which I struggled competitively with you.
My yard sale stifles the lawn,
Pours over my patio and infiltrates my porch swing.

I am selling each game piece, each memory,
Each pair of dice and their two-sided arguments.
They are thrown from my mind once they are carried
Away by strangers who thought them a bargain.

I am selling our immature conflicts,
The jail in my Monopoly
And the alarm clock in Don’t Wake Daddy.
Even Candy Land for me is age appropriate no longer,
As you continue to barely meet its mental requirements –
“for ages 3 and up.”

So I am selling away these amusements
Stacked firmly upon cheap plastic tables,
Feeding my palms with the richness of your absence.
Perhaps your game of Life will entertain one of my buyers,
Taking your cardboard words of wisdom
With an appreciation that I no longer have.
I wish them luck with their future mind-Scrabble,
As their pursuits will be a Risk yet unknown.

She takes off his glove to reveal
No hand at all –
Birds outstretch
In the shape of a palm,
extending feathers from his wrist.

They are startled by the rush
Of air, as it shocks them into motion.
They flap their wings and the hand
Comes alive.

The beaks work together as fingers,
Able to grasp whatever
She throws his way.  They are flighty
And subject to wandering,
They are curious.

For what do birds do but fly
About to discover the world?
They detach themselves from his cuff links
And wave their wings in a motion of goodbyes.