I am such a poetry whore....

*shakes head at self* But yes, I found two Stephen Dobyns poems that would work really well for a "The Return I" AU where they can't go back. Already shared 'em with lilyayl and blue_raven -- er, I think I showed them to you, blue_raven. *blinks* But it was rather late. Maybe I dreamed that bit. *shifty eyes*

Anyways, look, poems!

"Absence" by Stephen Dobyns

If these lines that I
see appearing on my face
were the lines of a map,
I would be with you now. 

If the distance between us
were as tangible as the ice
that I feel, you would see me
sliding toward you, full of
joy at having found you, sorrow
at having been gone so long. 

If my memory had the body
of a servant or thief
I would pursue it until it
returned what it had stolen:
already it blurs your face
with the faces of strangers.

“This Life” by Stephen Dobyns

“Maestro, chi son qulle genti che l’aura nera si gastiga?”
~Canto V, The Inferno

Blue sky to the south, clouds to the north,
racing tatters of clouds in between—although 
here only the first flakes have begun to fall, 
in the distance the mountains are tugging on
their winter caps. Outside, a spiral of snow 
whirls between window and forest’s edge 
like a man fighting his way out of a sheet. 
Inside, this is a college class on translation. 
The teacher recites the line: “ ‘I love
this poor earth because I know no other.’ 
Is it earth or country? What difference
does this make?”
		Once more I think of you
six thousand miles south in your poor country,
and again I count all the possible reasons 
why I haven’t heard from you—bad mail,
bad politics, bad love. I think of how Dante
condemned his lovers to an existence of wind 
and try to imagine us brought together
in the frantic white spiral that rushes between 
the window and winter trees. To be so joined to you—
the thought brings my heart to my throat. 
But without you—that’s me out there alone. 
Blue sky to the south, clouds to the north—
in another hour when this class is over
and the wall of cloud has reached the horizon,
the spiral of snow will have vanished: lost
in that falling white blanket, this life,
which as we return to our separate rooms
we will say is so impossible to walk through.

Also.... My university is trying to get me to do speed-dating. I'm sorry, I'm just not going to do that, school, even if it's for a charity event. ...Maybe if you had Rodney there. Okay, if you had Radek there. Seriously. Even if he slept and snored into the tabletop the entire time. But until then, no. And also? No.

*grin*