CAITLIN DWYER

Between

Winter night. High cold haze
and the stars prickly
burrs of light. I was content
 
to let other people map your
body onto the world; there was
still a faint tracery on my bones,
 
snail-etchings that glistened
with the leaving of the animal.
I didn’t know you were dying.
 
Or I knew, but I didn't want to.
I gave myself ten more minutes
before I knew. Ten more hours.
 
Two days. Three days. Ten days
before I held you and by then
I understood what the word
 
decouple means, as in the winch
has decoupled from the tractor,
as in the stars have decoupled from
 
their antagonistic marriage, as in
the body no longer holds in itself
a constellation of otherness.
 
Instead, the body understands
it has slipped out of its
beckonings. It wears unkempt
 
night worry. It wears unraveling.
What I did not do that night
will always be between us.

Caitlin Dwyer writes poetry and nonfiction. She has studied at the University of Hong Kong and the Rainier Writing Workshop, and she teaches, parents, and writes in Portland, Oregon. Find more of her work at www.caitlindwyer.com