Open Spaces

Open Spaces

by Kevin Cahill

when she looks at me

I understand only

that we have to get

this close

to see how infinitely

far away

we are from one another

I have to caress her bare skin

carefully, tenderly

to feel how far we have

stretched the tissue of gesture

the skins of words

that clothe us barely

and when I look into her green eyes

I understand only

that I might not be

here or there

that to dwell daily

in the heart of open spaces

that to fall nightly

into their spiraling silences

is to be held aloft

even if only for an emerald instant

before I behold those eyes

dart down like falling stars

and, plotting their trajectory,

I spy the safe harbor of a

hardbound book on the bedspread

or the narrow, familiar terrain

of her own wrist…

and when at length,

her eyes are swept

back up to me behind

their lovely lashes

I understand not even

this much

June 29, 2007