Going the Distance

fun and frolics in the movie language
of Hollywoodian clichés,
her in San Fran and Going The
Distance, her man inside sets in New York, supposedly
a comedy for romantics, but I wasn’t laughing, no

no laughs out loud, mere smiles at scenes of inconsequence,
then heart murmurs at scenes of consequence:

internal: airport lobby, daytime,
over-the-shoulder goodbyes and a lack of waves because
waving is too formal a reminder of the ocean of space
and the waves all colliding in the meantime
but in slow motion because that’s how time is, thoughts floating out at sea,
not how time is when the waves are trickles in the sand.

external: airport entrance, daytime,
lost lips found on the carousel wheel round to each other
again, how new is a kiss that’s been missed as much as theirs?

skin is skin untouched before, an adventure
of fleeting meetings re-alighting and departing;
                        these actors
are acting and they act like they’re suffering. These actors
are actors relaying my story and they act all in love, in love
and in pain,
         internal: some room, some time,
it does not matter, all things will come as this has;
the carousel of their lives like this cannot go on,
                          but they’re just
actors.

always the airports, the long nights and the holding as though
the airport is tomorrow with the ocean bound to follow
with it’s waves of twisted heartstrings, always

sweet hellos they know
are sweeter for it and that they wouldn’t change it, no

but always the goodbyes and that decision that must be made
to end the airport goodbyes.