Aimless Love
This morning as I walked along the lakeshore,
I fell in love with a wrenand later in the day with a mousethe cat had dropped under the dining room table.
In the shadows of an autumn evening,I fell for a seamstressstill at her machine in the tailor’s window,and later for a bowl of broth,steam rising like smoke from a naval battle.
This is the best kind of love, I thought,without recompense, without gifts,or unkind words, without suspicion,or silence on the telephone.
The love of the chestnut,the jazz cap and one hand on the wheel.
No lust, no slam of the door –the love of the miniature orange tree,the clean white shirt, the hot evening shower,the highway that cuts across Florida.
No waiting, no huffiness, or rancor –just a twinge every now and thenfor the wren who had built her neston a low branch overhanging the waterand for the dead mouse,still dressed in its light brown suit.
But my heart is always propped upin a field on its tripod,ready for the next arrow.
After I carried the mouse by the tailto a pile of leaves in the woods,I found myself standing at the bathroom sinkgazing down affectionately at the soap,
so patient and soluble,so at home in its pale green soap dish.I could feel myself falling again
as I felt its turning in my wet handsand caught the scent of lavender and stone.