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Alan Dunnett

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Trust

And always I looked at you hard
and when you walked behind me, I wished
I had eyes in the back of my head.
   
If you spoke of old lovers, I wondered
where the list might end for it was only
summer and though you were burning up
   
some juice was in you still. I discussed this
with myself without respite. Even the dreams
I forgot, I was sure, were of you with me
   
following and spell-bound or wanting
to follow and all around the others.
Then they said you were missing and I thought,
   
this is wrongly reported but, after, no word,
no message, so how could I be sure?
At last, they found me walking to the checkpoint
   
unarmed, with one of their maps, weighted with bribes,
weeping by the bank of a dead river,
arguing to cross before my time was done.
   
Now I wait, and the years pass, staring
at what I remember. You are my error
and at night your hair brushes my face.

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