Aperture
Open the window and you want to fly out,
though you never actually do—
I think I see you, still there on the ledge,
where I've left you.
How pulled-awake and flung
can one life be?
Again I thought, It will end.
Again I promised and clung.
I learned there that
to cling was in my nature.
I think I see you, though you flash
quickly through the shutter.
I think I hear you, though I sleep.
Remember this as a bolero,
a finite flaring—
both the tulip tree
burning in full bloom
and the weeping silver birch.
Copyright Credit: Jennifer Tonge, "“Aperture”" from (: , )
Source: Poetry (May 2005)