Two Vacations a Year

We’ll do two vacations a year

And you’ll take your photo

In front of brick walls

In Japan

We’ll get the picture

And travel on

On foot

By rented car

It’ll be that way

In Tennessee

And Ontario

And South Africa

And Cape Cod

A house will be borrowed

For a weekend in July

You’ll make yourself a fruit shake

Something with a special assortment

That you were told

Will help your skin

I’ll be upstairs reading

And looking out the window

At a soft ocean

And the rolling body

Of a man sunbathing

At the house next door

I call you hub

The hub

The guy

My guy

The best thing

The only thing

The soulmate

The soul

The spirit of me

And downstairs you pick out

What to wear

To a party

Where we’ll only speak

To everyone else

That’s you

That’s us

It’s always

Everyone else

And two vacations a year

The rainy day in downtown Portland

Where you kept your distance

And your silence close

I can’t tell anymore

When you’re upset

Or just unaware of me being there

Like I could go to crumbs

Between the sidewalk cracks

And you’d walk

Right over me

Dinners are eaten

Films are seen

Two plates are put down

Tickets purchased

Fingernails trimmed

I see you got a new pair of shoes

A haircut

That kitchen contraption you wanted

That shaves vegetables just so

This is not a happy life

But what kind of happiness

Are we entitled to?

Maybe all we get

Is all of this

And two vacations a year

I do the dishes

I make the plans

I book the flights

I choose the hotels

From across the table

I see you go to say something
And decide not to

This is how you go too far

Without taking

Any steps

The calendar says

Next month wouldn’t be

A good month to leave

And after that
There’s an after that

A wedding

A baptism

A concert

A trip

We’ll go away

And come back
And the first day we’re back

There’s a moment

Where everything looks the same

And strange

At the very same time

Some people want to feel something

Some don’t want to feel anything

And some sleep on the surface

Of a perfectly calm storm

Knowing there’s lightning

Underneath them

But not knowing how much
Or how it would feel

To go down

Into the darkness

And wait for the fire

To strike