The great thing about men is they remain
calm and watch the weather like a game of chance. Like them,
the trains leave on schedule, or predictably
a few minutes behind, and the newspaper arrives
a familiar lump on the sidewalk, recognizable with
hardly a glance from the first window opened in the morning. And
I am still asleep, face pressed into pillow, fingers flat
on the quilt, unimpressed by the clock moving onward, whether
taking or leaving behind what I love, what I must
remember, what I dropped last night on the bedside table. Nothing
I can say will surprise him. Imperturbable – if personification were still
possible, time would be hermaphroditic and even
as the man who slept beside me, easy with the inevitable (already facing
the world, or at least checking his phone). A man only,
gender definite, still his hands
are softer than mine, pressed one against
each eyelid, waking up, pulling together
the leftovers of night for the makings of day. I stand
my happiness (call it anything else – liveliness, choice, interest
in dancing) on the pressure of his arm draped
across my chest, a sensation just before stepping into
the shower, before washing off everything else.