WHAT MAYBE CAN MEAN

by Weston Cutter

 

 

She opens the door still buttoning
                              the last buttons of her shirt
               with one hand, smiles hi and we’ve been
                              this way two times already, now three—
               we know the chances but haven’t more than
                              kissed, we're early enough to be
               both sure and incorrect. Two minutes,

she says, fingers up and walking away.
                              She leaves the bathroom door open
               as she fixes stray elements of herself.
                              On her living room walls are pictures
               of her with friends—pretty groups
                              of pretty girls in pretty places, smiling
               like they mean it—and I’m sorry my friends

and I have no pictures of the moments
                              we’ve come to love and retell
               most—the midnight frisbee games, lakeside
                              wrestling stemming from too much
               beer and too few thoughts to the contrary.
                              The time Dan and I climbed that tree,
               age eleven, and halfway up, twenty feet into limbs,

Dan blanched and got a nosebleed,
                              admitted he was scared of heights,
               how I had to unclimb the tree with him
                              on my back, his blood marked across
               my neck, smeared on my ear as he held close
                              and whispered apologies the whole
               descent—Come here, she calls from within her room

and I smile. I believe in Saturday night,
                              in a woman’s voice asking for me
               from another room, in what maybe can
                              mean. She’s at her computer, one hand
               on the keyboard and the other reaching back
                              for me, opening and closing like something
               senseless, mechanical and charged.

I walk toward her clasping and unclasping
                              hand but can’t touch, fearful something’ll
               spark, shatter, both. She uses both hands now
                              and with a keyboard click she summons
               to the screen a picture of a penis with a woman’s hand
                              wrapped around it, with another click
               the hand begins to move slowly,

with a silent click my body sweats
                              and howls. She looks up and over
               her shoulder but I look down, past her face,
                              eyeing all the space between our bodies.
               She draws my eye for a moment, offers an unsure
                              smile—nervous, questioning—then takes
               my hand in hers, puts both on the back of her neck.

The hand so slowly on screen moves
                              and moves and I can’t look away
               though her eyes prey over my face. I don’t know
                              how to ask What the hell is going on
               and the video’s sounds—small human moans
                              of assent, a slow-building pleasure—charge
               and recharge, repeating. To touch now would mean

an ignition, a shuddering beyond good
                              or bad and I look down at her nose
               thinking blood, remembering how Dan looked
                              from the lowest branch as I lowered him almost
               to the ground, his blood smeared across both our faces,
                              how his color returned as he left my grip
               and fell to the earth’s, that final second

when his feet finally touched and how
                              he looked up so grateful, changed,
               the edge of his mouth stark as something haunted.
                              It’s okay, she says, her hand on my hand
               on her neck and my eyes on her made-up, shining lips,
                              watching her form words. right?
               I say nothing. I nod. Dan was most scared,

he said later, of those last four feet—
                              the difference between two reachings,
               couldn’t breathe from anxiousness for gravity
                              to grab and reclaim his shape, for his feet
               to catch on something trustable. Right? she asks
                              again, her smile growing, hopeful,
               drawing me into itself, something new. Right?

 

 

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