From the height of a miradouro 
I watch Lisbon ache. 
The day-moon bursts her half, partial 
even when full. You are somewhere else 
moving in new signatures. 

On the audio tour of a Moorish castle 
a room full of past wonders out at me. 
I have tried to take it slow, 
but the nights are short 
and wild persimmons infuse the air. 

Still there is pleasure passing from room 
to room, unseen. A verb like grieve 
follows close, faces all directions. 

Stones, a record of their wear, 
redouble the city’s heat 
six hundred years smooth. 
Wilting in high noon 
I pick the flowers growing beneath tram lines 
to press between pages of Pessoa. 

I wrote you a letter; 
there is a chance it’ll arrive 
before I do 
there is a chance 
it changes nothing. 

But not everything survives 
because it’s meant to. 

Though hope makes ribbons 
of despair, boxes 
of wine at a wedding, 
despair makes hope 
a profession. 

When the animal of evening 
drops its belly to the earth 
stars pop off; I watch 
from the tiled hilltop 
everywhere people laughing. 

Regret, a noun 
with no sense of direction changes nothing 
about a scar, because a scar is nothing 
but the record of its age— 
it simply recalls, like an incomplete tune, 
the longing in new signatures. 

Already honeysuckle 
and lavender have grown back 
through crossties, surviving 
as some things are meant to.

Amanda Merritt lives and works on the unceded Coast Salish territories of the Lekwungen and W̱SÁNEĆ peoples. Her debut poetry collection The Divining Pool was nominated for the 2018 Gerald Lampert Memorial Award. At present she is learning how to make creative writing accessible and therapeutic for all.