Recollection - a poem

I think her dog was brown.

I only saw it once, though, in a black and white

photograph – small and round,

with Batman ears, streaming away from focus

like background radiation,

an afterthought.

She was the foreground, focused finally,

framed by the light

of the Sarasotan sun, a singer at fifteen,

still afraid of thunderstorms that always seem

to come around midnight, her sour stomach,

and father’s drunken screaming.

We made plans to meet in Daytona, once,

but never did. Such was the nature

of our promises.

And now, these days, she blows her kisses

from softer images,

exhaling like fresh air beyond all the pedestals

and structures supporting her. She looks off,

to the left in space somewhere, toward something,

beyond and outward,

over the powder blue horizons, to an infinity

of other dogs greater than anything

I can conjure.