Dreaming of Another Woman

There is a woman on the other side of the world
Who is somewhat like me. Perhaps a little shorter.
Perhaps a little more delicate around the mouth.
There is a woman who sighs softly in her sleep
As she wrestles with a dream that lingers
In my mind as I sleep so far far away.
And that woman turns over in the empty bed
She fills easily. Or perhaps she turns and wraps
Her arms around the quiet form of another:
A lover. A child. A parent who is dying cell by cell.
And this woman, on the other side of the world,
Will never think of me, waking and taking my staircase
Slowly, up and down, as my thoughts of her fade.