23 DAYS

In the terminal

she waits for me

as I touch down from twenty-three days away.

Already

I'm running late

and I wonder:

will she wait for me?

will she recognize me?

will she love me?

It has only been twenty-three days

but already

so much has changed.

I have shaved

I have eaten cheeses I couldn't have imagined

I have experience in a language

that ought never to have escaped my lips.

And she?

Who knows what she's learned

in this extended leave from each other?

Has she spent time drinking with her co-workers?

The super? The neighbor's boy?

Has she discovered how absence

makes the heart grow fonder

- but not enough?

I thought it would mean nothing

this minor voyage

this experiment in separation.

But now, I don't know what to expect

when this dream apart finally falls

and I land, awake

at the terminal

at last returned to her shore.

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