Gillian Sze

The night is unfit

      but it is no longer a surprise. 
      
Of her, you have said it yourself:

      Tonight, she is enough for what you need. 
      
In bed,

      I lie awake 
      
            and make out the nuances behind my eyelids,
            
like how it looks beneath a drifting cloud,

      the brief shelter of a stranger’s umbrella,
      
                the way one would imagine what it meant
                
      for another to move on,
      
like a train waning to a point between two hillsides,

      a passing,
      
the further quiet when a door shuts in the dark. 

In the middle of the night,

I wake up like I’ve lost my breath

            and write my name over and over again
            
                        to keep myself from disappearing.

No one is dressed up.
They are brought together
to this bristled-mat altar
where they are simply rubbed clean.
Vows are whispered quickly
when they are slid off feet:
a toe to the back of a heel
like a final curtsy.
There is no champagne at this wedding,
no croquembouche,
not a single rubber sole touches
a shard of glass.
The pink slippers are scuffed
and the tennis shoes are frayed
and they’ve caught love
like overlooked gum on the sidewalk.
There are just the witnesses:
the dirt that they’ve picked up,
dried leaves and grit
from pavement, beaches, shortcuts behind alleys –
all scattered between the letters of the altar
that spell out Welcome.