Practice makes imaginary backhands perfect
Air tennis is in the air family
of endeavors, like air guitar
or air making love. I’ve looked
for a pile of love on the bed
after the real deal, something
beyond the stains of lubrication
and joy, it’s a myth
like Sasquatch though not as hairy. We make
fuck, to be bluntly plosive: it’s love
that gets us to bed and once, yes,
a picnic table
near where the next morning,
the tide came in
to our tent and said, pretty much,
this is my tent now. Things
floated that never had, how many things
want to be boats and how many boats
am I going to put in poems
like this one: row boat, toy boat,
dinghy? Some number. Put me
in the last poem-boat, light it
and send me to sea. Sometimes
I feel I’m just going
through the emotions like a man
casting a line over and over
to the river of his grass,
catching nothing and getting better
at catching nothing all the time. 