Whirlpool

 

If you call this whirlpool of stars 

in your heart, "the soul,"

it becomes a shadow

searching for its echo.

If you call these waves 

of drowning sweetness, "flesh,"

you will sink like a stone.

Shall you call it "love," this sky, 

where our bodies dissolve  

like mist into each other

until lightning jolts us in two

with a Word that falls from silence

in a rain of cinders?

Yet what has burned away

has no name.

That is the dark energy

we hunger for.

Use the scriptures for kindling.

Toast the commandments

in the fire of the heart.

Scorch the gold-leafed seeds,

each containing the germ of "should."

Slit the throat of "thou shalt not"

with a single stroke of the blazing

sword of emptiness.

Now let your actions arise

as a fragrance distilled

from roses burning in the marrow

of your bones.