David St. John

The ledger opened in rain. As always, for her,
The ink of the past ran together into the ink of the present.

Scotch Montana had undressed in Ohio, still a skinny girl.

Now, after 30 years—divorce, failure as an actor,
Panic attacks on the freeway, the flesh gathering
Around her . . . she undressed, naked as Narcissus
In her desire, in the vortex of her self-regard,
Twirling those rags of her pain:

The mother she hated, no, the mother, she said, who hated
her—the father, the brothers, the land. . .

She'd emerged from her past with no one, but with books,
Gorgeous books, accounts (both acute and accurate) of
Her passage through men—many men—poets, designers,
Friends, & also those few women.

If he asked her to marry him at 9 A.M. she would
Marry him at 9:01. Devoted to the dream of them. Domestic,
& covered with plaid shirts & campfires, with pines
& conifers covered in snow, the branches littered by light.

He was never there every moment he was there. It was love
Of something, & not in. She wanted anything, anything.

He was always never there, always leaving, always
Returning for only a moment of nothing, she saw,
Nothing in the end. That's what she had. Not even the land.