For Paulynn

I watch her run
And wonder what exactly
She is running from.

Like a gypsy she comes,
with bags stuffed
full of clothes, an orange
and some magazines she found
to redecorate my house.

She is always running
toward something,
So swift
and full of electricity
that I vibrate
when I hold her,
kinetic energy
narrowing the distance
between us.

I smile at her arrival,
Knowing that my heart will break
once again
before she leaves.
She smiles for a moment:
the rainbow before
the tears drops fall.

She tells me how much
she loves him
and how conflicted he is.
And then she asks
if she can brush her teeth,
I watch her rummage through her bags
like an oil derrick against an evening sky,
to find the toothbrush
that comforts her
more than I could ever dare.

She tells me she loves him
but all I see is her flight
from something yet unnamed
to something yet unknown,
even to her self,
However possible
it is to really know ourselves. .

I try to calm her,
as much as I can,
folding her into my arms
like the white cotton sheets
that I take out of the dryer
on laundry day.

I know how fragile she is
feeling her heart beat heavy
through her chest.
I hold her sobbing shoulders
and dry away salty tears
trying to make her still,
so she could
find
her own rhythm.

But fluttering wings beckon
and like a bird in flight,
having touching down
for a second,
she is gone
once again.