This Is Where I Keep Poems I Like

by Dorianne Laux

Look at me. I’m standing on a deck in the middle of Oregon. There are friends inside the house. It’s not my

house, you don’t know them. They’re drinking and singing and playing guitars. You love

this song, remember, “Ophelia,” Boards on the windows, mail by the door. I’m whispering

so they won’t think I’m crazy. They don’t know me that well. Where are you now? I feel stupid.

I’m talking to trees, to leaves swarming on the black air, stars blinking in and out of heart-

shaped shadows, to the moon, half- lit and barren, stuck like an axe between the branches. What are you

now? Air? Mist? Dust? Light? What? Give me something. I have to know where to send my voice.

A direction. An object. My love, it needs a place to rest. Say anything. I’m listening. I’m ready to believe. Even lies, I don’t care.

Say burning bush. Say stone. They’ve stopped singing now and I really should go. So tell me, quickly. It’s April. I’m

on Spring Street. That’s my gray car in the driveway. They’re laughing and dancing. Someone’s bound