Marginalia

Found my handwriting the other day
in a wrinkled scan of Joyce Mansour’s
“The Cancer”—

a stain I don’t remember leaving
between “cancer” and
“dust in my mouth”

The tragedy of desire:

when you see your mother look at your father,
and you see a woman loving a man
loving the air at the ends of his fingertips

and yours learn
to grow callouses.

The cursive grew small and
staggered at the end,
as if to hyperventilate

a warning I missed from my hand
to the corner of the page—
prepare for impact.