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I shall come again.
I could come again, and soon, I think,
but cannot think of what is proper for young
heroes to say, he said –- and thought,
I shall never go away –- but what
has gone away?
Standing, staring
into the mirror, the glass
etched with six hairline cracks;
cell by cell,
rib by rib, collapsing.
Rib, each rib, visible in
the reflections dusted
into the corner, pilings applied as
ashes to foreheads of men and
women,
the women.
What do you want, Sibyl?
I want to die.
What do you want, Wendy?
I want to fly.
I recall their spiraling
reflection in the tiled floor,
dancing,
going down,
down… As I drag chapped knuckles across
the desk, writing oh, nothing really
at all.
Looking to the mirror, hushing,
bones.
Between your body and my body
I feel no breath of life.
My shadow, a pale shadow,
wanders about the room
below the bed,
above the desktop typewriter
before finally
settling upon the keys.
A toothed strawberry
on our nightstand
and beading mahogany skin.
Bed sheets in mangled patterns and
a bottom lip whetting, with no instruction
on when to begin.
And this is what I wonder:
Is there a breath of life within this room?
And what do we require;
and what might I record when I roll out
here
in a poem.
If these lines move in any manner
we may call them prose as
piano keys move from hard to light
as a stone drop in mud to a bubble burst in a tub.
And should you ever go,
in search of me, claw down deep,
and
use common words,
and a standard cadence when you speak,
spelling:
Within her I can acquire the taste and smell.
And the taste tastes the same as the smell.
Setting slowly into the evening,
turning the pages, one by one –
sip by sip;
a table in the shade.
Stone bridge across the Seine.
You know, move your
hips along the
side of the sheet and
sigh slide your arms
in circles; remain, there.
Don’t allow a sound;
come along, come alone.
Let’s visit
by two candles –
two candles and
porcelain plates
two of them, too
movements missing
with two candles
and porcelain plates
glasses
two glasses next to the plates
near the candles full of nothing
in particular but
streets, crossing
directions
we are losing right
turn right
around your neck a
scarlet scarf twists
twice you are so
delicate that when you sit
along my side
I shall twist twice
tonight I shall
twist twice.
Everyday some shall do something and
I shall sit doing this, which comes like
simile or as, and as like or as never home.