Separation

You in the high-walled fortress of sleep
I on an island of wakefulness
bird-haunted, trapped by mist

You eyeing the warm milk of suspicion
I drinking the green rain of the seagull’s ocean

You on the red deck of the last ferry going under
I on the amusement pier lost in the crowd

You going forward into the mirror
I crawling backward into the teeth’s cavity

You in sunglasses
walking towards the sea on a street that backs into the sun
I sliding on ice across the abandoned freeway

You in prison waiting for redemption
I in the asylum counting billiard balls

You climbing stairways, humping buckets of soapy fisheyes
I descending the silver elevators, escorted by clouds

You on the night bus that leaves from the ferry wharf and goes
across the stone desert to the other side of the earth
I on the top floor of the brightly lit hospital,
beating the glass with my hands

The night is cold
The poplars are grey in the headlights

You have opened the paragraph of silence
I was closing the volume of inaudible sound

Peter Boyle in Coming home from the world