Suite I: Beginnings

Page Turner

At the bookstore in Castro
I met you eye for eye-full
catching your nervous glance
at the magazines
the catch in my throat
I fetched a book to distract me
reading my heartbeats between the lines
you scratched your forehead
I smiled to myself, like putting down
a really good book.


Untitled For Now

I remember back when I was seven
my brother traced the lines in the palm of my hand
claiming it would reveal
how many children I would have
he studied the creases and said "none."

Could he predict my homosexuality
or my pending loneliness
signs mean something only in retrospect
foreshadow is for stories predetermined
and yet my life is a game of solitaire
hand after hand without a hand to hold
I tell myself I can hold my own
who needs the complexity or complications
when I can keep it all so easy.

I read somewhere that we cannot tickle ourselves
because the brain anticipates, compensates
for the pressure of a predictable force
I pondered this and my easy solution
in a life without surprise
without the hands of another
that I cannot anticipate or control.