There’s a place for lovers, and there’s a place for fables.
We weren’t at sea but the waves still lapped at our toes,
and when I flew out of the tree into my beached kayak,
I could believe, just for a minute, I was the squall,
or the grand seagull that you threw your burger at.

Let it all spill back like the India ink bottle left on my desk,
and let the canvas sails warp beneath the gusts.

This wind scares me, for if it’s not the wind, it’s you.
I know you’re the reason the great squalls find us.
My dad used to tell me fables, and they went like this:
My dear, could you forgive me for being me?
And after I sail the world, I promise to find us.

I know, those words you whispered, those words,
but at twenty I loved you as if we had a whole life.

In this ocean filled with every star fallen,
I needed to cry in your bed one more time.
Let the way you hold me remind me of us

on the beach in Chicago where we drank Mai-Tai’s,
And in truth the wind came from your wire fan

that we found in the free bins during graduation week.