I had imagined her upon a hill,
half-clad, the breeze between her legs.

I am a passenger in the car.
The car is going nowhere.

Once, I saw her in a rowboat,
drifting out to that little island
way out in the bay.

There are certain details about my job
that torment me.

She is always in some vast and open space,
abstracted and remote.

Last night I had a dream in which the rats
finally eat the man's face.

Yesterday, the dress she wore was white,
her shoes the color of cream.

The man was hanging from a pendulum,
and the pendulum dropped, as it does
in some big clocks at the prescribed hour
(while the spring rewinds),
before it begins its climb again toward
the future.