Kept Burning and Distant

by Linda Gregg

You return when you feel like it,
like rain. And like rain you are tender,
with the rain’s inept tenderness.
A passion so general I could be anywhere.
You carry me out into the wet air.
You lay me down on the leaves
and the strong thing is not the sex
but waking up alone under trees after.

-from The Sacraments of Desire: Poems