If I Were Born A Daughter, My Parents Would Have Named Me Audrey

If the theoretical physicists (those secret poets)

are onto something, then what is true

is that there exist infinite universes floating like bubbles

where everything that can happen, is happening.

In this universe, I catch my reflection in the tinted lens

of a stranger’s glasses and will my features to soften

like a popsicle’s hard edges in the heat. Elsewhere

in the privacy of another bubble, I am dropping a yellow sundress

from its rigid hanger. I wrap it around my skin

the way I wrap gifts. In this another universe

that carries my another me, she sees a treasured friend

and pulls her close to say hello, the both of them glinting brilliantly

in another sun’s another eye. Imagine

another intimacy. Another ginkgo tree. Another hymn

to sing. The secret poets say we are constantly

bumping into other bubbles, with the faintest possibility

of merging. What hope there is in physics. I reach

my hand through the oily glimmer window

and pull the next one close. It never pops, because I’m gentle.

When I get near enough I can see right in, and like a body

into a sundress, I slip through

and into.

Dear Reader,

there has been a moment

where I   looked   my own mother

in the eyes       and momentarily               forgot

her          own name. I am      profoundly ashamed.

It seems                  I am always losing

memories             like tumbled keepsakes

off the    back of an over    stocked moving     truck.

Sometimes, I can grab it              before it’s gone, recall

what you    wore the        night

of the super blood            moon, the intersection

where you     pulled glass   out      of my bicycle  tire.      Reader,

do you       remember?         Mostly, I   reconcile

with what           I don’t even   know      I’ve lost.

My brain, an etch-a -sketch

on a fault             line. A secret

sand message too                           close

to the tide.           As          aid, I    depend

on the word         of my friends. You       say

we ate twizzlers                 in a park at midnight? Tell me

again, love.      We’ve met             before? I believe

you. Forever       the optimist, I     find

some small relief in        this        : don’t worry,

you can etch     some uncertain   sadness or spectacle

into       me and it  won’t               be long

before it’s             lost.                                                 —Oh, dear reader,

I’ve told you      this story        already?  How

many times?