Vacations

You exist in typed words

and messages left

with intent to reply,

It's spring and oceans

warming to swimmers

hide you from me,

endless blue sky pushes out

and away against the clouds

moving north to find a place to rest,

or readying for rain,

They say you're miles away,

it feels like more,

I'd count them but they don't make tape measures that long,

or so the woman at Home Depot says,

I think you're on an island somewhere,

in the spring, in the summer,

in the past, morning when its night,

a day before and a day behind,

The summer is waiting patiently for your return,

light on steel wings and rudders,

over ancient temples, decayed cities

and painted rocks,

The wind carries word from you,

the spring has your name in its air,

and when the past catches up,

I'll be there to see it.