Perhaps you have to accept the first

as such

to accept the second.

 

Second,

nothing was this abstract.

There was the sidewalk between her

and the tree, and the cluster

of tourists (so I assume

they are because I cannot imagine

seeing enough of here

to call it home)

between the tree and her photo her

hovering

spilled into my

anticipation like

her red buzz cut

spilled over a “dyke” label with

unironic joy, spilled and left the overflow

gleaming like her smile

on the sides of the letters.

Nothing was abstract.

Tourist cluster past I

failed to wait

like I would have on a day

not overflowing.

 

“And save the best for last.”

 

No, I try to explain

later, not the kind

of shoving back into your body clamping

down the lid,

like when a man calls “hey baby”

from the same periphery.

More like someone

filled your body up with enough

of itself that you feel

it could spill over.

Like on that one axis,

tree—traveller—sheer-cut joy

your body is enough.

She would rather watch you hurry

on than have her photo.

 

Do you understand?

How long I have longed to be someone’s best

saved for last?

 

Of course—First,

an abstraction.

On our way in, a rainbow

welcomed us through the Lincoln

Tunnel.

But because nothing

can stay that abstract

it lit us close

ups of spray paint close

enough to see how it mingles with the wall’s

particles, not close

enough to see

whether it is anarchist A’s

or segments

of a machine that spits out hearts.

 

To get that close,

you need the second, need that moment

when you realize how bad

you want your heart to not

have been mangled in that machine, how quickly

you would let a stranger with her hair

approximating its gleam

fill it and kiss it back

into place.