Where Have You Hidden

The title borrows the first line of St John of the Cross's Spiritual Canticle from which much else is borrowed; the quote is from the Song of Songs, chapter 6 although I was thinking specifically of the late Stanley Kunitz's garden, in Provincetown.


Where have you hidden?

“My beloved is gone down into his garden” 

When the day breaks into
grey embers,
will you come see me, come to
find me alone?
Would you come before?
Would you have known me then?

Hills fall to the leopard’s
pursuit of the hart.
Each afternoon the eastern sky
answers the rain.
So our lives moved in opposition,
each step reflected in the other’s.

Would you be singing to me now
if I could still hear?
Would you be listening to me
If I could still speak?
I move away, you move closer.
I move further and further away.

I wake and watch you sleep in the chair.
Your hair catches the light.
I can’t remember
if I have ever seen these colors before.
I can’t remember
your name.