Three poems from The Window

These Words

The words I had for you were small
presents saying light things, and I had
filled them with my breath, like a bouquet
of balloons.  Then, I thought they might
float off unless I tied them to you
or pressed them firmly into your grasp.
So I stayed up all night making them
into inflatable lifeboats.  I know you know
they are too small to ride.  Also,
they often crash although they sail up
rivers we have only dreamed, and even
disappear, with their secret cargoes, 
into those distant interiors where

you may find one ripped open on a sharp
day, addressed to where you are, these
words, strewn among wave‑smoothed pebbles,
but the cargo still there.  Rare coins?
No.  Only little phones that keep ringing
until you answer and the operator says,
"A person‑to‑person call: will you
accept the charges?"  And I will say, "No,
Operator, it`s person‑to‑person only.
The toll is paid."  And to you: "The coins
are in you, not in those boats I made.
When you look inside, you will see.
The flipside is a map whose face is yours."









 

Mosaic snakes devouring themselves,
They peeled their apples and oranges
And knew, like broken bottles,
Light's shattered chromatics.

I heard them singing:
We eat and drink our thoughts,
Consumed by work and love.
Time our only angel.

Awaking, I heard Democritus
Decanting perpetual
Rain whose particles penetrate
Our congealed bodies waiting
For the current to recall them.

It is snowing, raining, shining.
I am sailing, sailing.

Shaken loose by a star's
Far, violent rhythms,
Inside me, echoes
Regain the drift
And draw
Wind for the sails of a galleon
Dreaming the discovery of distances.

I heard them singing:
Dead sailors, all,
You were the dream of a stone
That nurtured leaf and flesh,
Gave you a mind to dream
And wanted back its gift.