Falling

The pottery places in memory we run our hands over, more forms in one place, The moment of you on the corner, your smile stepping off the curb then the ocean, the bay, the freighters, and then you on the dock you put on your glasses, apologizing, explaining you are slowly losing sight in your right eye, tricking me into loving your right eye more than the left. And telling me how it happened, the moment in the fried chicken place, your boyfriend in the jeep outside, the tilt of the floor, your cheek cracking the tile and the tile cracking your cheek.

It all happened on the first day, a Friday, sun and cold, and it began with you on one corner, me on the other. Your smiley sign language, crooked smile, asking me If I want to cross or will you. The slow signs of a waltz in your hands and fourteen words for your smile but one missing, the one word for this, falling and rising at the same time, and maybe that’s another reason your smile’s crooked. The things that escaped me standing on the corner looking at you on yours, the bloodflow of traffic between us.