When and wherever I
look at something, I can't help
but imagine I'm
seeing the whole picture.
It's a different problem than
the one you might be thinking:
mistaking trees
for whole forests, calling
nine guys a baseball team, and so on;
it's more
like how I force myself to look
at your face while I'm
talking like this,
because then, I'll believe—that you
are really in there,
that then you can see
and hear me too,
that your head was ever even
close to the house
you liked to call
home in the first place—
it's also like standing
on the edge of this pier
while I do it,
then, gazing out over
the darkening water and realizing
this is me, all alone
on the ocean—
instead of just
on the shore.
