First Person
____________________________________

In the rear-view mirror an egret
lifts off from swamp grass;

in the driveway you wave me away.
I leave the original way, in person.

But you, remembered, are sharper,
more beautiful in the poem, carried

this way, the way a playwright
might feature your gestures

in the act of the heart breaking
over and over so the sound of the heart

breaking is sharper and more
beautiful than the original heartbreak,

so nearly unbearable you'd never
wish to feel it, directly, again.

 

 

 

 

 

 

From Causeway by Elaine Sexton, 2008

New Issues Poetry & Prose, Western Michigan University, Dept. of English,
1903 W. Michigan Ave., Kalamazoo, MI 49008-5331
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