Maybe There’s No Going Back

Used to be he

was my heart’s desire.

His forthright gaze,

his expert hands:

I’d lie on the couch with my eyes

closed just thinking about it.

Never about the fact

that everything changes,

that even this,

my best passion,

would not be immune.

No, I would bask on in an

eternal daydream of the hands

finding me, the gaze like a winding

stair coaxing me down.…

Until I caught a glimpse

of something in the mirror:

silly girl in her lingerie,

dancing with the furniture—

a hot little bundle, flush with

clichés. Into that pair

of too-bright eyes I looked

and saw myself. And something else:

he would never look that way.