Norfolk, By Forrest Gander

From across the room, its clutter

of voices, I can tell it is you

who has called us long distance.

Don’t ask me how.

Your absence is my slow,

painful intoxication.

Things I would say

if you asked for me.

Once, before my attic filled with owls,

I laid my head on your belly

and listened to your childhood,

a girl leading the white

bull to the fields. In sleep

you spoke, but the word was drowsy,

I didn’t understand it.

Into your hair I mouthed your name,

into your body’s lovely neck.

And I thought, then, there was some limit

to set on my pain.

From “Lynchburg” by Forrest Gander. (Pittsburgh: $9.95.) 1993 Reprinted by permission.