THE MISTAKE
In April, when she tried to take him there,
a farm where winter had not heard of spring,
where snow lay banked on rutted roads and winds
went shimmying up and down slick roofs and trees,
he took one look around and said, "God, let's
get out of here!" not seeing anything.
Luckily, night blanketed the backwoods
and they missed the bus, so they went inside
the house and she thought of cows in their stalls
and bread in the oven, of the simple life
collected here within its own crude warmth,
while he stood smirking, repeating, "You would."
The next year it was Washington. They went
by train and all the way she kept checking
tickets, bag, baggage, feeling she had left
something behind, and though he joined "the tour,"
she realized with a start that it was he
missing and lost to everything new.
Everywhere was "like the postcards" and nowhere
"was worth the time and trouble it took to get
back from." In fact, if not for the car
she bought for later trips, they might never
have seen the stars, how they moved together.
"Not all," he said, "not all," and they fell apart.
It was like that all summer, and even
a continent full of moons did not change
the difference between mountains and prairies,
and she wondered how the others managed,
the men and women living there. "Heavens!"
he said, "I've tried! Let's call it a mistake!"
"Let's," she answered, knowing she would stumble
over the same stones, up to the same door,
till she came to the last and final one:
single admission, standing room only—
which was natural, when it came to dying,
but no way to live, unless you had to.