One More For the Record(A sestina, written for UVA poetry class, spring 2001)

The rain-wet sidewalks hiss and fume when you leave

Because they ponder your non-return

Down the road you drive back homeJust so you’re weeks and worlds away from here

Where I remain nowhere in particular, but by myself

Taking the bronzing evening squarely on the chin.
One small tear starts its path down my chin

Trying to make a case for you not to leave

Me here by myself

Only begging for your return

About a million times a day, where here

The thing that’s always on my mind is you and home.
Unfamiliar feelings have several times born a home

Deep in my chest, knocking me on the chin

Every now and then just to remind me that I am here

And on Sundays it’s always you or me who has to leave

While there’s almost a guaranteed return

My thoughts are left only to myself.
How often I hide my fears deep within myself

Where my gut has become their very own unhealthy home

Hoping one day to be able to return

To where they really belong, which is somewhere closer to my chin

And possibly leave

Out of my mouth and find you here.
Whatever this here

Has become I’m not really sure myself

But it always manages to leave

Something missing since I met you, even though I’m at home

Sitting here with hand under chin

Thoughts once again to you make their quiet return.
I start to lose the meaning of return

Because it makes a circle always ending here

Which somehow manages to by my chin

Or somewhere deeper within myself

Searching for the bright light and home

Continuously behind the pain of leave.
Now I’ve managed to lose something here, thoughts escaping not through my chinBut rather through my self, the very home of my insidesWho try to return, and only always leave.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sestina