The November air
Has curled the new leaves
Of the spider plant, strung
From an L-bent nail
Driven in the warp of the window
Frame. Maybe the woman down
At the desk has a few more opinions—
On the dying plant, or the high
Bruised clouds of the nearing storm,
Or the best road
Along the coast this time of year
To Oregon. This morning, after
You left to photograph
The tide pools at dawn, the waves
In their black-&-white
Froth, I scavenged in your bag
For books, then picked up one
You’d thrown onto the bed, Cocteau,
Your place marked with a snapshot
Of a whale leaping clear of the spray
Tossed by the migrating
Herd—a totem
Of what you’ve left to dream. Yet,
It’s why we’ve come—Hotel Sierra—
To this place without a past for us,
Where, I admit, a dozen years ago
I stayed a night across
The hall. I never asked why, on this
Ocean, a hotel was named for mountains
Miles inland. I spent that cold
Evening playing pinball in some dank
Arcade. Tonight, I’ll take you there,
Down by the marina with no sailboats,
By the cannery’s half-dozing, crippled
Piers rocking in the high tides and winds
Where I sat out on the rotted boards,
The fog barely sifting down,
The few lights
Looped over those thin, uneasy poles
Throbbing as the current came and went.
Soon, I could see only two mast lights
Blinking more and more faintly
Towards the horizon. I took
A flask of gin upstairs, just to sit
At the narrow window drinking
Until those low-slung, purposeful
Boats returned. As I
Wait here this morning, for you,
For some fragment of a final scene,
I remember how I made you touch, last
Night in the dark, those
Summer moths embossed upon the faded,
Imperial wallpaper of the room.
Now, as I watch you coming up
The brick-and-stone path to the hotel,
I can hear those loose wood shutters
Of the roof straining in the winds
As the storm closes
Over the shore. I listen as you climb
The stairs, the Nikon buzzing
Like a smoked hive
Each moment as you stop in front of:
A stairstep; a knob of the banister;
The worn brass “12” nailed
To our door; the ribbons: knots of paint
Peeling off the hall—
You knock open the door with one boot,
Poised, clicking off shot after
Shot as you slide into the cluttered room,
Pivoting: me; the dull seascape hung
Above the bed; the Bible I’d tossed
Into the sink; my hands curled on
The chair’s arm; the limp spider plant. . . .
Next week, as you step out
Of the darkroom with the glossy proofs,
Those strips of tiny tableaux, the day
And we
Will have become only a few gestures
Placed out of time. But now rain
Slants beyond a black sky, the windows
Tint, opaque with reflected light;
Yet no memory is stilled, held frame
By frame, of this burlesque of you
Undressing. The odd pirouette
As your sweater comes off, at last,
Rain-soaked slacks collapsing on the floor.
Tomorrow, after we leave for good
The long story we’ve told of each other
So many years not a friend believes it,
After we drive along the shore to Albion
To your cabin set high above the road,
After we drag your suitcases and few boxes
Up to the redwood porch,
After the list of goodbyes and refusals ends,
We’ll have nothing to promise. Before I go,
You’ll describe for me again those sleek
Whales you love, the way they arc elegantly
Through water or your dreams. How, like
Us, they must travel in their own time,
Drawn simply by the seasons, by their lives.