calculations

the sum of all i do, i am, like water.
my thoughts, i’ve come to know, are just the currents.
i have a gift from you, a journal with no ink.
what would i etch so
carelessly there? there is only one
first page, and only one last,
or so some think.

perhaps i’d start by writing how
your shape is in her smile, bouncing
the baby on her knee.
the cost of not is different than
the cost of do —
maybe the math is not as i’ve figured.
water is, after all, not earth.

for all that i did not is like the space
behind the books when i pull them to
the front; the shelf looks full but there
are gaps behind, holes i left when i did not ask
or did not call
or did not stay
or did not tell
you stories, which
is all we have.

that which takes up matter, matters
more to us, our bias weighed by gravity.
one day i knew it’d cross my orbit,
so i tried
to reach you with my stringed body straining toward
the sunset, below the gaze of painted saints,
recycling my exhalations and es ist ein ros —

— a rose, that springs forth
every season —

i like to think you,
having seen forgiveness fully
would lift enough
from all my fingers clenched
around the pages, not the pen.