Sitting in Patisserie Cloud, sipping
sugared milk, I am sure of it. It would
be easy to wait for you here, tipping
the fat French man for his time, sighing “Good
heavens” at every third paragraph
of the local news and sketching a lace
wedding dress in an abstruse color. Laugh
when you come looking, won’t you. Try to trace
my movements with your fingers. I plan to
practice the faces I sometimes try on,
like bright unaffordable clothes. Each shoe
matches something. You keep finding me gone—
Or almost gone. Maybe you will win when
you find me. Or when I vanish. Yes, then.

© 2005 by Jenna Cardinale. All rights reserved.