Wave

Tell the truth: no key appeared in your mouth, 
no sound like mum, which wouldn't help anyway. 
Give me a word to get through the night. 
Something spontaneous, fluid:
see the hand's unintended imprint on the shore,

fireworks dissolving into the black sky--

      Try now. Ripple. Yes.
Put the two of us in a boat on the gray river;
keep rowing in a circle while on the hazy banks 
clumps of grass swarm and echo the rhythm of words 
we had once spoken: after this, mistake me for someone else.
Sleep no more. Wave. Wave. That's love enough.

From Trace of One, by Joanna Goodman, published by the University of Iowa Press. Copyright © 2002 by Joanna Goodman. All rights reserved.