Waking without You

Another call and message left
while I stand at the stove,

waiting for the coffee, pretending
not to hear. Outside the window

a buck stands in the field, head cocked
like a telephone, all rapture and ear:

when I see him, the antlers
coming through harvest

that stretches ceaselessly
across the plain, it is not

unlike your hand
on my body when it gathered

another yield in the dark—
more like the locust, than the buck,

at the wheat’s throat, more
whittling it open, then coming

through—noise
low in the flesh,

in the field,
more waiting

for that ache
and after, echo

of the ache
in air.