"Past is prologue"
Rain across
an awning outside
the window
streaking against night
It's quiet
and I am not here
A memory steeped
like fragrant tea.
"What's missing is"
The wind's blow on the river
and the current, the sound
of water lapping at the broken dock.
To the left
a shadow of a city and the sky above it
an echo of a passing train.
This all must count for something
an answer must be hidden here.
"World line curve (or, there to here)"
i.
Today I touched a painting
painted in 1382
my fingers sang across
the colors and the gold leaf
felt the time between the time
they were put there and just then
six hundred years, more.
Can you imagine?
Six hundred years between
warm hands
and a few cracked figures
staring past me.
ii.
My tongue thrills
at the sweetness
of cold figs and yoghurt
a spoonful of honey.
Each bite
the best one taken.
"No Theseus"
How is it that we get here anyway
face to face with something more
than the quiet exhalation of a night kept in
the half-heard whisper of tomorrow's expectation.
We can only twist so long
dance around the corners of a memory
before we finally reach the bull
and I am the coalesce of sun and wing
the lampyrid freed of the jar.
Tell me, where then
is the apotropaic token I've waited for too long
where is it that we reconcile
the labyrinth with the axe?
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