Looking Through Old Pictures (DF)

There is the vascular restriction of life

as it stands

            the heartache of waving goodbye to yourself

            putting yourself on the bus

            the tail lights red and sad

                        as you pull away.

 

And letting go in this moment

            walking home from the bus stop

   into your home, where everything is

   strange again, as you feared it would be

the last time you did this.

 

There was one life in Baltimore,

            red brick houses, driving

            your daughters to ice skating

            there was money gone to seed

 

And another in Spain,

            a short bus ride from Huelva,

   near the ocean and the Portuguese border,

            where you lay in the sun to read

            where you wandered a country lane in the dark

and were startled by the visage of a

            white horse, smelling the air,

crouching silently, breathless,

            that it would never leave.

 

And this one—what is it?

What is this picture of you?

            alone, padding through the snowfall,

            near the hospital, breathing fog

into the air.