Given

 

I give my poems to other mouths,
the mouth of the cocoon,
the mouth of the tear in a snake skin,
the mouth of the trough between dark waves
where wind is born, the mouth
of the sparrow, but it must be
a kind of sparrow I have never seen,
living in a desert olive tree, near you.
I give poems to the mouths of roses
that grow by the sea in a ruined abbey.
I place them in the parted lips
of evening, ambiguous curvature,
holding a final drop of fire
in the silence between earth and stars.
You are gone, I do not ask where.
I drop this poem in our wound,
the well of emptiness, the fault line
in the shattered mirror of our seasons,
as you pause to breathe
through your entanglement,
unable to tell if this be Winter
or Spring, Summer's end or Fall.
Let this poem be a kiss
on the mouth of "ever,"
in the frail brown body
of the word, "ever-changing."


Painting: Bouguereau, Girl With A Pomegranate

3 comments:

Dana C Chamseddine said...

No, it is not given!
And I will never go!
You know this very much!
How are you!

Dana C Chamseddine said...

No, it is not Given!
And I will never go!
You know this very much!
How are you?

AKL said...

Dana! You knew this was for you, calling over the waves of the star ocean. I miss you!