You, in Michigan

You don't invite me

to your family's cottage this summer

though you could have, though

last year you held me

in the cold mornings

on the screened-in porch

before we shuffled towards the wood-burning

stove and coffee in the kitchen.

This time you run the Cherry Festival Race

with only strangers—mostly tourists—

cheering you on, and you kayak

further into the lake

than I ever could. Maybe

open sky is what you need

to love me right after so much

city, so little direction. Manhattan

is thirteen miles long, but the island

in the middle of this lake

wouldn't hold a house, not even

a cabin, so you sit in the weeds, decoding

your heartquakes, again and again,

so unlike Traverse City, its predictable

festivals and cherry-themed sales.

So unreliable, that trembling.