Resolution

Whereas the porch screen sags from the weight of flowers (impatiens) that grew against it, then piles of wet leaves, then drifted snow; and Whereas, now rolled like absence in its drooping length, a dim gold wave, sundown’s last, cast across a sea of clouds and the floating year, almost reaches the legs of the low-slung chair; and Whereas between bent trees flies and bees twirl above apples and peaches fallen on blue gravel; and Whereas yesterday’s thunder shook blossoms off laurel the day after they appeared; and Whereas in the dust, the fine and perfect dust of cat-paw prints scattered across the gleaming car hood, something softer than blossoms falls away, something your lips left on mine; and Whereas it’s anyone’s guess as to how long it’s been since a humid day sank so low, so far from the present that missing sensations or the sensation of something missing have left impressions in the air, the kind a head leaves on a pillow; and Whereas the last of ancient, unconvincing notions evaporate from the damp pages of thick, old books that describe how, for instance, Time and Love once lay together here; how in a slurred flash of light she turned and waded back into the sea, and how the slack part of any day was and is all in the way he, half asleep, felt her hand slip out of his; and Whereas, the blue heron stands on the shore; while the sleek heron turns, broad to narrow, half hidden among the reeds; turning with the stealth, the sweep of twilight’s narrowing minute, of stillness taking aim; turning until it almost disappears into the arrowhead instant the day disappears, until, staring out of the reeds, the aforementioned heron is more felt than seen; and Whereas, you, with due forethought and deliberation, bite into an apple’s heart and wish it were your own