In the morning, the sleet —
the sleet in the morning past the overhang
will make a hard line between past —
a hard line between our time
and most of the time, you in the doorway —
most of you past the doorway, my heart —
can I say my heart?
can I say like a flicked sheet floats —
a bed sheet floating away from grasping hands?
In the grasp of the bed I watch the door close,
that closing like the sheet’s crumped, off-centered fall.
This is a kind of praying you say —
you say this, it is still night.
And yes, like a prayer, said every night
and yes dear heavenly —
pale chests pressed like heaven-bent palms,
bent supplicants pressing, asking
may I ask something more
of something more,
something more pressing —
pressing as if it were the boundary between us,
the erasing of it, that would answer the prayer.