Let's get it on

A NOTE TO FUTURE LOVERS

Nevermind the salt of faith it takes

to imagine you are out there,

patient and vague, unaware even

we might one day be seized

by that almost sudden nakedness

of which Marvin Gaye sang.

Perhaps in the vestibule of time

you’re clutching the pamphlet

that is the story of your life,

stunned by the page upon which

my name swims up out

of the dense murk of text

like some cyclopean bane of sailors

with a mind to swamp

and sink. Maybe that will be me

and you will demand

that I explain myself,

how I came to be there

in that specific slant of the singular sun

on a day no more precise

than the millions preceding it,

and whatever else I say

know that I am just as surprised as you.