Remember 
those airmail letters
you sent me

and I sent you?
Blue ink on
tissue-thin paper,

hearts bleeding 
in mid-air
across the Atlantic.

“Come visit me
in Paris,” you
wrote. “You are

special to me.”
So I took you
at your word,

and in October 
1988, boarded
a plane at JFK.

~

Two years before,
we were the ultimate
summer romance,

canvassing for
Greenpeace, French
girl and Indiana hick

in New York City,
heads whirling
with kisses.

I locked 
my keys
in the Greenpeace

station wagon
six times 
that summer.

~

You went back
to Paris, while I
floundered 

in Brooklyn,
bank account
echoing,

canvassing days
over, road 
to my adult future 

curling 
like a question mark
over your bare shoulder.

~

It rained on us
in Paris.
Fresh from 

the teary airport,
we sloshed
down the Champs Elysses,

hair plastered 
to heads, warm coffee
and croissants 

in an amber cafe.
Your eyes shone
with disbelief,

mine reflecting back—
that summer two years ago
had been real.

~

Downhill
from there,
spooning in your bed,

you turned your cheek
away from mine,
read me letters

from all the lovers
you were juggling.
“Help me,”

your eyes seemed 
to say. “I just can’t
decide.”

~

The rest of Paris
is a blur 
of solo visits

to crowded
museums, mangled
French — “Ou est

le Louvre?” — 
melancholy walks
by myself 

down lamplit
cobblestone lanes,
and the farewell lunch

we had back
on the Champs Elysee,
steak tartar,

cold,
red and glistening
on my untouched plate.

~

I picture you
thirty-five years on,
kids grown,

husband number one,
two, or three
rummaging 

in the attic,
finding my yellowed
letters 

in their red, white and
blue envelopes. 
He raises an eyebrow,

asks your puzzled,
wrinkled face: 
“Now who, exactly, 

was Scott Waters?”