If you wait for me-- Don't wait for me to be whole-- 
I'll be here with my Amethyst and Monkey Bread

If you want to wait for me
by the bus station in Norristown--
stand in the white little tunnel that
goes underneath rail road tracks.
I've never seen a train
but I know there must be one
because the tops of the tracks
are polished silver from
destinations and sliding stops.

If you want to wait for me
look for a me in my
Bulky black winter jacket even though
it's May. I'll be carrying a blue
bag of stockings and square dresses
and a tan satchel of varieties of
oatmeal because I microwave
my sense of home at the bottle
of a white bowl.

If you want to wait for me
I will be tired. I'll talk about 
how my mom used to make Monkey Bread
when I had sleepovers and how
I liked to peel off the pieces--
even if just to pass them to someone 
else. I'll talk about my rock collection
and the little caskets holding
the corpses of sediments and metamorphosis.

If you want to wait for me
I'll smile and I'll love you.
I'll tell you how if you start
a bread crumb trail at my wrist
we can end up somewhere that feels
like August and not like March
and get lost in a snow squall
in April without it getting
too soggy. 
I might cry about how lonely the bus
looks as it saunters away-- a diaphragm 
heavy with breaths held in anticipation,
wonder, and the type of fear
that no one talks about. The kind of fear
that flutters-- delicate and sharp
like slivers of Amethyst.

If you wait for me I can't promise
I'll be whole. I can promise I will
be carrying a bag of oatmeal and that
I will find something beautiful about
the way you don't rush to greet me
like the movies because you know I'd know
that it's cliche.
But that's what I love about you--
You've never waited for me to be whole--

You take the misshapen offering
of a Monkey-Bread girl and look
at the cinnamon sugar like Amethyst.