I looked for you along the river
In its blue current
When I ran.
And I looked for you in literary theory
In thin abstruse pages
When I read.
And I looked for you in myself
Far less often
When I wrote.
And I looked for you in birdsong and warm breezes and
Fresh hot coffee and those few times the sun came out
Last winter. I looked for you in trite and trivial occurrences
That harbored schematics for my life.
When my mind turned inside-out and painted the walls red
I should have asked myself: What was this conspiracy?
Instead,
I read meaning into everything.
I saw symbols everywhere. I drove myself mad
Looking for an answer ‘out there.’
Then I took a break—I was forced to take a break;
To wait with your absence.
By waiting, I realized
What was missing
Wasn’t you;
It wasn’t me either.
What was missing was hidden in the shadow of the fear
Of what taking a chance might mean;
In believing that two roads once diverged
And never reconnected.
What was missing was the brazen
Embrace
Of being wrong wrong wrong wrong
And never getting better;
But getting somewhere,
And being something
And being something
And being something.