Chapel
by Aza Pace
after H.D.’s “The Pool”
The women in the windows are / up in narrow blue. I hunt for you / in their still faces. Like my pulse in a seashell, each is alive / because I am, tense and silent in the aisle. I / echoed across this floor for a sharp touch— / divinity, or close to—so I’m asking, where are you? /
I can’t make it go—I walk out. If I see you, / godling, it happens outside under the live oak’s quiver. / Chunks of sky like / beach glass hang in the lead branches. By a / vision, I mean I almost catch a bright fish / darting across my eye.
I / watch the leaves cover and uncover / shifting blocks of you, / one veined hand at a time. I sway with / them—ridiculous—as if to hold you with my / body, myself a net. / For that flash, I feel what / you are— / oceanic, everywhere. You / dapple my face, and I am banded. / For a few breaths, yes—Among many watching creatures, only one.
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