Lambert

This woman I love told me she is from another planet,
and as we sit in the car, engine running, watching the
suitcases and trolleys and goodbye kisses float by
one by one like snowflakes landing on our tongues
--ephemeral, beautiful, flavorless impressions--
I think I agree with her.

Her eyes are vibrant, her cheekbones tall and proud,
and her hair curly, short, inspires you to cut off your own,
overnight gray from a spiritual awakening that left her
too wise for my kind. We hold hands and my mind feels blank
as one of the travelers--an old friend I've never met--catches my eye,
catches me people-watching, catches sight of my parted lips
and my arrested heartbeat.

She and I, we hug goodbye, our farewell more esoteric than normal.
More unsettling. More eerie. More permanent. Frighteningly permanent.
The wheels of my luggage grate against the pavement and
my heart wishes these unpleasant thoughts away
and she drives away.

He greets me at the water fountain. His dark eyes, the dimple
on his left cheek, his outstretched hand beg the question of why
it's been six long years without more than a smile in the parking lot.
We talk like long-lost brother and sister about Peru, about injustice
(we always knew it would be so) until it's time for me to board,
until it's time for me to lose her.