The burden of four decades…
I sit, hunched, at the crumpled bed,
Lights off, the city of a body, raw,
Still melting, hiccupping the kisses
And sparkles, the milk of a mother’s fondness.
An announcement of age leaping
Body and soul of a girl growing,
A young woman fumbling,
A grown-up woman, alone, like a tunnel,
Wishes and cakes invading, eager and firm.
The whiff of a tempest or two, beating above
The nameless silence of a new year
And its insolent promises.
My dusky body, the mortal flame of a light.
I lie between the goblets of my old days,
Between the twilight glory of birth,
the solitary bell of death.
Love deepens, darkens
As a coal-drift, each wound, a murky engraving,
Each day a new song.
The day is full of summer love,
Sprinkled with embellishments.
Behind them, I hid like a spider,
Soundless, trembling, barefoot,
Leaning, picking up my distant, drowning days.
