Two Figures Sitting & Walking

    It is in that thought that we collect ourselves…
            Wallace Stevens “Final Soliloquy of the Interior Paramour”

Everyone spoke Spanish at the Grove Street
Grocery Store established 1953.
Massive burritos, gargantuan, stuffed
with spicy rice with seasonings
we hadn’t tasted before.

	
**
Somewhere everything makes sense
and I love without my usual greediness
or so I imagine. 


Because: It is in that thought that we collect ourselves.

Because:  It is not possible to float and watch the stars while drowning.


**
Food as despair/delight:
Even now my dead father demands I devour everything.
Even now my late sister-in-law prepares plantains 
buried in salt and oil.


At Grove Street, we ate because we ate.     Together.


**
Okay.   Okay.


I tell you again because it is remembered
as true & 
we move toward a river.


You ask: Is that a body floating face up? 

Had I the nerve I would have said: 
Does she notice the stars?


I do not understand why 
your hand reminds me of hunger.