Things feel partial. My love for things is partial. Mikel on his last legs, covered

in KS lesions demanded that I see the beauty of a mass of chrysanthemums. Look,

he demanded. I lied that I could see the beauty there but all I saw was a smear

of yellow flowers. I wanted to leave that place. I wanted to leave him to die

without me. And soon that’s what I did. Even the molecule I allowed myself to feel

of our last goodbye made me scream. What would have happened if I’d opened

my heart all the way as I was told to do if I wanted Jesus to live inside one of its

dank chambers? Whitman told me to unscrew the locks from the doors and the doors

themselves from the jambs. Let love come streaming in like when the St. Joe flooded

Save-A-Lot and drove it out of business. The only store in town. Don’t put my ashes

in the river Mikel said. Put them in a tributary. I did. I put them in a tributary without

touching them. Now I want to chalk my fingerprints with them but it’s too late.

I want to hold them like he held me and touched my upper lip and called it cupid’s

cusp, a phrase that made me wince. I felt love all the way then, and never since.