Dust by Michael Meyerhofer

Dust
Michael Meyerhofer

It seems we’ve left skin
in each other’s lungs. I should have

looked under your bed skirt
for my wallet, but how

could credit cards compare
to the sneeze after we’ve parted?

Gone and still you make me
reach for a tissue—still my palms

turn circles in the red
breakwater of your heartbeat.

I want to tell you, I have nothing
but respect for your ribcage

now that we both know
it’s not big enough to hold us.

MARGINALIA

Remembered reading Meyerhofer before. He has a brilliant poem about death and ashes and urns (been meaning to post it but I keep forgetting). That one made me laugh because after Lolo died, that’s one of the things we discussed in the family: Lolo’s ashes, and where it will go, given the feud within my father’s family.

Anyway. I’m not really in the mood to think about that, so here’s another poem from him.