Sometimes it’s Easy to Know What I Want

On a road that cuts through the richest, non-irrigated land 

in the nation, according to some Lancaster, PA, natives, 

a minivan slowed, and a woman with a good hair cut yelled, 

Do you want a ride, or are you walking because you want to?  

I didn’t reply because my life felt so wrecked—

no matter the reason, either you get this or you don’t—

wrecked in the way that makes gestures of tenderness 

devastating, like the time I showed up in Minnesota, brittle 

with sorrow, and the professor sent to fetch me 

asked if I wanted heat in the seat of his sports car 

or the local apple he’d brought in case I arrived hungry.

I didn’t know people make seats to hold a body in radiance 

like the merciful hand of God.  The apple was crisp and cold 

and sweet.  Maybe I looked in his eyes and shook his hand 

in both of mine when I left, I don’t remember.  Months later, 

he sent an empty seed packet, torn open, lithographed 

with a fat, yellow annual no one grows any more, flamboyant

as Depression era glassware.   That was all, thank you.

Thank you, oh thanks so much, I finally told the woman