lines from The Time Traveler's Wife that make me feel things

"I hate to be where she is not, when she is not.  And yet, I am always going, and she cannot follow." (Henry, x)


"I am suddenly aware of myself standing thin and upright in a Meadow where everything has flattened itself down and so I lie down hoping to be unnoticed by the storm which rolls up and I am flat on my back looking up when water begins to pour down from the  sky.  My clothes are soaked in an instant and I suddenly feel that Henry is there, an incredible need for Henry to be there and to put his hands on me even while it seems to me that Henry is the rain and I am alone and wanting him."  (Clare, 72)

then/now

once, i was a universe,
the expanses of stars and the intrepid explorer.
I was the newborn foal and the knock-kneed doe; uncertain, eager.
I was still, unblemished water, and long gulps of cool air after diving.
I was a dirt road, bare clapboard walls, rooms to be filled.
I was a phone call home, and the future wife, and the names of your children.

I gave it all.  I gave it all.  

Now, I am a filled-in map, no borders left unchallenged.
I am a burned-out light bulb and the fumbling that follows.
I am a picked clean, sun-bleached skeleton and the buzzards overhead.
I am feet encased in concrete and dirty bathwater circling the drain.
I am static, a dead line, the click and the dial tone.

I take it back. I take it back.

a poem about nick jaina

When he sings, his mouth barely moves

His mouth is a cracked slit, words eking out like

a secret he still wants to keep 

He interjects stories in between the verses of the songs he’s written,

and on this pressed plywood floor,

I am transported. 

We are standing in an alley. 

We are leaning against a brick wall. 

Our breath makes clouds in the air and he says,

quiet and self deprecating,

I don’t know if I’ll ever fall in love again.  

Sometimes I cannot sleep.  

I’m having trouble eating.   

I thought I was doing what men do.

And the music loops and his fingers slide and he is reading pages from a diary like we are all his closest friends. 

I do not feel like I deserve this. 

He sings, I have the same tattoo -   

Mine is black and hers is blue,

and I’m in Primary Ink leaning over with my spine exposed. 

Kai runs the needle over my back and I

hold my breath so that I won’t move. 

I hold my breath until I am dizzy, and the tattoo feels

like a slap on a sunburn. 

Jordan sits in front of me,

lets me squeeze his hands so tight his fingertips turn white and cold.

He kisses my head, tells me he’ll love me forever. 

He kept that promise until he didn’t have to any more.

Now I have the memory marked in my skin. 

Bold, black ink across my spine reads “Mea Maxima Culpa”: my most grievous fault. 

The voice at my back shouts, you are to blame. 

You are stained with guilt.

You are the one  mired in remembering.

I have the same tattoo - 

Mine is black and hers is blue.

And the music loops and his fingers slide and I

Do not feel like I deserve this.