The Traveler's Daydream

Leaving, his mind plays games —

the clouds are islands in an air-sea,

Buddhist forests and impossibly concave salt bluffs

overlooking fantasic airships and jellyfish. \ And —

On the ocean floor, almost ready to leave her desk,

he sees her touch a hand to her cheek

and hesitate — should she allow her mind

to play just one game, and let the hand be his?

— Then he blinks it away, and deliberately

returns to his book, keeping his mind

to safer games of others' conception.