I’ve looked and yet to find
a word for the shrinking
of temples and scenery
upon a second visit.
Those grand roofs once grazing
the sky, melting into mountain,
become buildings touched by
the hands of workers with tool boxes.
And, I’ve looked and yet to find
a word for the inaction
of gods. Pennies and pennies
of prayers in a slatted wooden box.
Covered in chicken wire, their faces
a kaleidoscope of aged paint
and splinters. Fragmented selves,
I now see only what’s been left out too long.
Still, I’ve looked and yet to find
a word for worrying about hair
not spirits while wafting in the gray
smoke of incense. Thinking about photos.
But trying to hold on and feel it. Suddenly
ready to leave and standing too quickly.
Mistaken for god's whisper, the vortex of air
caught between two trains.
Lighter: John Doe
I want to write a poem
with your name in it.
Strangers rolling their tongues
in your name. Names
bouncing off eardrums. Yours
I want to write a poem
with your name in it.
Strangers rolling their tongues
in your name. Names
bouncing off eardrums. Yours
sang in high chorus to the pillow
soft clouds in May, when those
last drops of rain catch on the
tips of your jet hair and splash
onto you gray shirt, diamonds
dropping to the river. Finally
Home. I want to write a poem
with your name in it. So that
you may never know what truths
I've kept onto. What lighter still sits
on the ledge of my bathroom
window -- where you smoked
and thought of leaving.
I want your name to leave me
so I give it to the strongest mouth
to feed on, breathe on, praise
out to gods on. But mine, I want
a poem to spill out about nothing,
but the darkest day of winter
and the warmest day of spring,
and not you, nothing about you.
soft clouds in May, when those
last drops of rain catch on the
tips of your jet hair and splash
onto you gray shirt, diamonds
dropping to the river. Finally
Home. I want to write a poem
with your name in it. So that
you may never know what truths
I've kept onto. What lighter still sits
on the ledge of my bathroom
window -- where you smoked
and thought of leaving.
I want your name to leave me
so I give it to the strongest mouth
to feed on, breathe on, praise
out to gods on. But mine, I want
a poem to spill out about nothing,
but the darkest day of winter
and the warmest day of spring,
and not you, nothing about you.
