Poem: A Lover's Recourse (waiting and to hide)

attente / waiting

He thought, the sides are never constant in a door.
The side you cannot see is the back of the door.

Someone can get easily lost in this old house.
Take note: the full-length mirror hides a secret door.

The apple wears its skin so well—I mean, so tight—
I cannot find the catch to open up the door.

In this great city where you can go every night
with a different stranger, every bedroom has a door.

The curtain goes up. An old man hunts for the scissors.
This time the silk will not walk in through the door.

All God’s saints know that waiting is an activity.
Nothing stays motionless and certainly not the door.

So he kissed you again at the bottom of the stairs,
how does a kiss nail a man, Jee, to the door?


*

cacher / to hide

Morning I sat in bed and opened up a book,
put it down, picked another, put down a fourth book.

Iowa has decided for gay marriage.
So proud of his home state, he wrote on Facebook.

The sun is shining but I am in shadow here.
The story is happening now outside a book.

What can I say to you? How will you take my words?
The real question: how does Alone advance our book?

There was too little to begin with. (Or too much.)
Two dates are not enough for writing a real book.

That is the lesson of the sun. Except the nights
instruct me how to press the sun into my book.

Because I cannot tell you what possesses Jee,
my hands have written up my suffering in a book.