White-Nosed Months


I cannot bear living
in this half-light, buried
in the blue of your body;

     the way it would unfurl
     slowly, opening
     a galaxy of lilac.

     Everything fades quickly
     in the cool Michigan air.

Snow is always falling here.
And for some reason I love you
can only be heard as apology;

Trembling, our time together
was an effort to survive
these immutable patterns,

but remains a false azure,
a prayerless confession,

a pale eclipse of an I’m sorry
against a steady foreground of white.


  -Adrienne Lewis

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