Friday, January 9, 2015


the true houses of memory, 
the houses where our dreams
lead us, the houses rich
with a faithful oneirism, 
recoil at all description.

to describe them would be to visit them:
the nuance hence speaks the color

we must, to the contrary, 
transcend the difficulties 
of description to discover
the antediluvian eggshell

she is truly a cosmos
(and is she not beautiful?)

so far-out that memory and imagination forget

their surroundings, 
their shoes, their names. 

Must we not render fixation 
her virtues?  How we trace 
ourselves, day in and day 

out, in our corners 
of the world?  

in its millions of alveoli, 
space is composed of compressed 
time. space is about
                                  that

all of our shelters, all of our refuges consonant
with the true histories, eggshells that once housed us

even after we trailed off from the hunting party 
to pause on a rock by the side of the lake

the lake was not man-made
the lake twirled a necklace
                        
twice 'round your neck in a gesture 
so shocking we thought it a firework 
lit by the hand of a still-innocent child

who refused 
to take off her gown
once Halloween 
had come and gone 

or to surrender 
the holiday tree until, 
finally, it fell into 
a heap of dust

on the first day 
of spring
 

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