There was a time she was everything
all the minutes of the day
all the songs on car stereos

Her words on the phone-electric
her fingers on my shoulder-sizzling

Now her memory is stored in a closet:
as identifiable remains

I don't see her in the night sky anymore
I probably mistook that flashing light
for something astral

Only because I wanted it to be so

There was a time she was everywhere
Hovering about their orbit
Flitting from here to there
Smiles and eyes sparkling
Their words in her ears-sizzling

There was a moment when she was everyone
she had ever met, the travelogue of
summers spent in earnest
anticipation of autumn,
a sunburned wind-walker

Now her closet is cramped with potential,
all heavy coats and unravelling sweaters.
The protections,
shelved and ordered,
benched for exposed skin
and sunburned shoulders
that wait for impossible rains

There was a time called 'America,'
when rocketships whizzed through the sky
and there were 2.5 cars
in every suburban garage,
happiness purchased on credit.

But now the garages are empty
and the closets are cramped with memory:
they're all driven out to the lake
to search for identifiable remains
of the dream they saw wither and crumble
like a satellite fallen from space.

There was a time when I wrote her name
and the words that went with it
were "love of my life",
and the days seemed to pass
with hardly any effort.

But now the days are hard work
and I spend my time alone,
with every memory tainted
by a sense of loss and betrayal
I never thought I'd experience,
until the day we fell from orbit.