Infidel

---

I watch you take pleasure

in salting chopped avocado,

squeezing lime. Yesterday,

I picked half-burnt cigarettes

out of the flowerbed

and tried to convince myself

silk is a shadow

but not a silhouette. Teach

me to believe I’m always

a child. You asked me

if I was afraid of the dark,

of losing you. No/yes/why,

I said. I’ve watched you

cradle the excavated shell

of an avocado. I still

don’t understand how

belief can ever be enough.