Driven by a Strange Desire
I. Before Breakfast When the sun turns gray and I become tired of looking at your many-colored shoes I will give you balloons for all the holes we speak too much to fill. Who believes in air, nowadays? Or do you prefer tea with the dried fruit I will have to throw out the window of your room? Because I want this to stop I want this to stop I want this II. Towards Moorish Spain To kill the dragons is a different thing in my family there are only lizards. In Sevilla--never famous for its lamps-- a dissected crocodile hangs from a roof. The reptile, the Crown’s Byzantine gift. Its teeth suspended in the air of the cathedral. I stole a pair of shoes; but didn’t run far from the orchard where water had women’s scent. Thirst is not fear, thirst is not green, but has wings like dragons, or airplanes. As oranges in Sevilla, driven by a strange desire to stay where they are. Floating. Suspended. III. Towards Virgo The Milky Way is not only expanding; the Bang is not only a Bang. It is drifting and being pulled away from, let’s say, something. Because dark matter is ninety nine of what there is and visible matter is so small it clusters together and forms a Great Wall. China and Spain and my eyes reading the paper. We are still together, are we not, wondering if.
Credit
Poem previously published in Fence magazine. Reprinted by permission.
Date Published
01/01/2009