Was it always?—What do you mean? Infanta asks. I mean,
The darkness situated in the trees…I suppose the last thing
Worth remembering was this sudden sketch: white egrets like dashes above us,
Rising over the estuary. Was that her living silence? Miss Nobody, to you. Still
Assembling & dissembling. That white body like a gasp beneath me, then.
That wasn’t at all what I was asking you. I’m sorry, but sometimes it seems
The last thing worth remembering—Cypress in the wind,
The ribbons of sunlight twisting off Point Pinos, the lighthouse squat
& polite nearby. Was that the ending? No, the simple beginning
Of an ending. Were you in love? Yes, like the spray of waves
Along the rocks, like the deer dancing through the umbrella pines,
Like the fog gathering over the sand & moving in…. So why
Did you leave all that? I didn’t leave all that, all that
Left me—All I can remember is the fever of her body, the white
Ember in the long pillow of the bed. Is that all that you remember now? No,
Of course not. But it still remains the last thing worth remembering. Tonight.