Unknown Artist, Horse, standing, c. 1870-1875
Albumen silver print
Image courtesy of the Getty Museum/Getty’s Open Content Program
To stay on the horse,
look to the left or right
of the blinding.
On the second day
at the Opéra stop
a woman stood and gestured to her seat.
Years of wishing and falling
short, I shook my head and took it.
The first of three days
harboring uncertainty
I hauled myself up
the steep hindquarters
of Montmartre—wide steps, uneven—
dead end of pastis-colored houses
and to the church
where I lit a candle not for you
but for my grandmother
who late in life
dreamed of a little pied-à-terre,
walking to Mass each morning.
You, then, a cluster of promise
some portion of which
had bloomed red and damp
on landing. I thought: Of course.
Errors in the nuclear code.
Down the culvert.
Waited a beat too long.
Didn’t want enough.
Still: how I fled the stifling
famous bookstore, cooled myself
with boules of fraise des bois
and pêche de vigne, could not escape
the scent of smoke.
Three days abiding
wilderness, mind canted:
living partwise—lest I upset
wave or particle,
relic or spark.
Then in the office
behind a stone garland
a doctor named Valentine
turned a dial, and the small white room
filled with thundering hooves.