Not once, not twice,
but all the time—
the way the heart beats, the way the wind
breaks through the branches, unstoppable,
and empty, and going somewhere.

Not once, not twice,
and never again
will I doubt that your strong heart will break
through breaches and branches,
and get somewhere.

But all the time,
abandoned, I wait where the dead wind beats,
and the dead heart breaks—
in the broken places
where the wind has taken
me once or twice,
and time and again,
and left me, once or twice, like a heartbeat, waiting.