Lost
I lost a collection of
Linda Pastan’s poems,
at midnight when I awoke,
looking for something to
fill in my mind
of absence.
The thin booklet I fetched
from a shelve in bookstore
with quite some effort,
and the help of a clerk
who put me on hold
for quite a while.
I went through all
piles of un-sorted books,
the bottom of my bed,
the back of a bucket
that stocked water
since the year of a major earthquake,
until I panicked
and told myself that
I must stop
this vain search.
I wondered how you felt
when you realized to have lost
the collection of my short stories
that I gave you,
“I could not find it my house,”
you said,
“nor in my sisters’ house;
or could my brother took it
away with him?”
I wondered whether you panicked
as I did,
or you just pretended not,
lest to add fuel to the
blaze of my vanity?