Leaving Anna Karenina

I remember the heft of it first—
how it filled the cup of my hand
like a winter-worn brick
polished slick by ice and wind,
layered with thick cream stock—
papered with mink-dark curls,
with steady, truthful eyes,
with the rough cloaks of awkward villagers,
their backs sloped beneath wagon shafts,
and the flutter-drooping lids
and ivory-carved shoulders of Russian lives—
to be thumbed like resolve
from preface to endnotes.

On the cardstock cover,
creamy skin blushing
under a black beaver kolpak—
that dense fur I wanted to touch,
to run my fingers through, knowing I could not—
framed by Zhivago-white,
Anna in snow, the picture of poise—
a body balanced on its own center,
longing held steady,
thought weighed beside action.

I remember my palms splayed wide
to hold it open,
how I loved her in Moscow,
the radiant architect
building bridges of forgiveness—
who for three hundred pages
mends the lives of those she loves—
her mind a room with all the candles lit.

But I avert my eyes,
as she takes the hand of Count Vronsky—
already knowing where it leads,
look down at my wool-stockinged feet,
ashamed for her, unable to meet her gaze.
I know what’s coming.
I know the train is on the track,
the candles dimming—
I feel the narrowing of every room—
her frame no longer ivory.

I insert a rumpled bookmark
when the morphine first gets mentioned—
and my thumb stops counting pages.
Its resolve spent.

I’ve known too many Annas,
too many Vronskys—
sometimes a boy, sometimes a girl—
sometimes a needle, a bottle, or a pill.

A closed book goes on the nightstand.
Then the shelf.
Then takes the trip to half-priced books—
five cents on the dollar—
too thick on thin shelves.