The key you lost

The key you lost

                          

lives like a fugitive on your skin.

It is the prelude to our memoirs,

a poem fused to nectarines, an exploration

through Copper Canyon, visions

of Haiti’s angels licking my ears,

a hypnotic belly dance on the sand

matching the colors that mesh

on your hip scarf, an experiment

we refuse to put down, an invitation

to cross the doorway of the home

I no longer occupy.

The key you lost is not the manual

of a digital camera, or calendar entries

for next month’s readings. It is not

a Popular Mechanics article you wrote

to put food on our table,

or a classified add on craigslist.

It wants to be the bungee jump

into the pangs of a deer in heat,

the obituary of bolted doors,

a list of all the vacant walls

on which we'll scribble

our erotic graffiti.