Impression

The Impression

It's not that you left a mess,
but being next to use the bathroom, late,

that evening you first stayed the night,
after you had washed your face

and changed,
I knew you had been there;

your signature, still wet: invisible ink
drying in the warm, damp, perfumed air.

On my grooming shelf your bracelet,
with its star, slipped off, a steel snowflake of undress

suggestive of a naked wrist; and my shaving mirror
at a dizzy tilt, looking at the floor, as if abashed,

a full moon of mist, a slanted pool of milk, overcast
in a blush of steam, at what it had just seen;

tipped to fit your height; your toothbrush in the glass:
you leave an impression as deep yet secret as the bite

which leaves the little row of
shadow-teeth in fruit,

or the tell-tale hollow, the indent,
you left in my pillow, usually vacant.