I.
Your letter returned unopened.  
I saved it that way.  A year later your
birthday, unmarked.  Winter coming.  Don't think
of this as silence.  Remember
the notebook you kept?  

II.
He scatters me with his touch—gold fingers
through green velvet.  Grasses going amber.  
Even needled trees reflect the slanting light.
 
His sleeping face:  Michelangelo’s dying
slave.  I dream we sleep in an old farmhouse,
walls washed white, white curtained
windows.  A door swings open
or closed—spiral stairs, shadows.

He¹s driving. I ask him about heaven
and hell.   Turning, he says:  I think
there¹s heaven in every moment.  


III.
I gathered everything, before learning
the rules of the places they would keep you.
Here, earth’s crammed with heaven.
Now I understand nothing
can be saved.  I’m saving it all for you.