the interlude: a poem
I.
Walking outside,
her eyes big as chandeliers,
a smile the length
of a glance,
and the space around her,
—fragile—
rushed by hummingbirds
that spill their secrets to her—
and you entangled
in advances
and debts owed
to the night,
to her outstretched arms,
and her gaze
that was never yours
and never would be,
except here,
under a waxing moon,
by a drought-drawn lake,
where you have thrown
the world at her feet,
tired of trying
to make everything fit.
You chase each other
naked
to the water’s edge,
where a drunken moon
reels back and forth
between stars
and quaking aspens,
and swoons
against the night sky—
like she does
against you.
ii.
Now
the in-between.
The empty spaces
between then
and now –
the days since and
all the ones after.
Now you find yourselves
nothing more
than a number
at the bottom of this page,
a footnote, (1)
an explanation
for the serious reader
of how
your names once sang
the moon to sleep,
or how Your longing,
whispered from eager lips
once prayed
to be ransomed,
for love.
That was then.
Now your names
Are just names
kindly listed
alphabetically,
under the letters
L
and O
in the index
of this obscure poem,
this forgotten
treatise on love.
\1] I and O , letters dated 5/30, 6/1 and poems share 7/24. See The poem, “the Day Sveta Received her Epiphany“. See also Lyuba Kuzmina, collection of essays Exploring Love Amidst Drought and Betrayal 1957
© 2025 Chris Leibow — Salt Lake City artist and poet.
poetry, collage art, mixed media,
Explore more art at leibow.art.
Christopher
Christopher Leibow is a poet, visual artist and a sensei is a lay minister with Bright Dawn Way of Oneness Buddhism and is the sensei and founder of the Salt Lake Buddhist Fellowship which he has led for ten years. He has had his art and poetry published international. He lives in Salt Lake City and spends his time with his two youing boys Teague and Ronen
