Always halfway beetween the one and the other,

Broken into ever smaller pieces and spread

Out in all that we say and all that we have done,

Until it seems there's nothing left of us to loose.

Two strangers who meet, and for a brief moment

Are reflected in each other, and then part again, -

Always halfway between ourselves and what

We want, but cannot have, between all the things

We would give, but are not able to, - halfway

Between wanting and regret.

II

Outside on the road the cars slip by.

And you lie on your side of the bed and

I on mine, while the cars throw fast glints

Through the window, and the frost lies

On the branches outside. And I think,

That in her dreams I am another and

Another place than on my side of the bed

Beside her.

And we close our eyes and dream

Of another life, beyond these two halves

Of the bed, which not even our bodies

Can cross.

III

And if we could do it all over again,

Would we really know each other any

Better$ Would we be any closer after

All this, or just more aware of how far

Apart we really are$ You, I and all

Are rocks, untransparent and heavy

In our own shadow; a pair of dry lips

Whispering in the dark, groping hands.-

A small glint, and then nothing.

IV

I erect this as a wall with a window

To speak through, but the only sound

Is the qiuet click of doors that irrevocably

Opens and as irrevocably closes behind us,

Though we are not aware, before we

Suddenly are so far apart that nothing

We say gets through, and we are lost

To one another, in our own foreign land.

V

Strangers we, who find each other

As forgotten remains in a drawer, between

Old recits, some dried flowers and a tin

Of loose buttons. All that we were and had,

Thrown together in a couple of boxes

And marked with a new adress. Suddenly

You are a stranger, one I do not know,

Another part of you that I cannot see or

Be part of. And that night the space

Between the two halves of the bed, is an

Ocean, bottomless and dark, where

Shapeless shadows glide unseen above

The deeps. And you and I like two

Undiscovered continents beside each other. -

A tiny flicker, that is all.

And this is my only defence:

Dried flowers and some coatbuttons,

And my words halfway between you and me.

Alexander Rubio