LITTLE TRAGEDIES

All the wonders and complexities a star can hold
you can hold—
no human wish exceeds you

*

Beloved, you who do not
exist, you who never were
but always dwelt in me
the unextinguished flame

*

And so I lose myself inside your gaze—
what is unsayable now
is unsayable forever



THE LEAVING

To die. To speak that word.
There is so much in death I do not
understand, the bright room
stripped away, the pain
receding like a distant ship, and still
we cling to one another, as if
even in our leaving we are
not alone.


JAMAICA POND SUITE

1

The sun plays piano on the water, unsure
of what keys to strike, a timid
student, hiding every now and then
behind a cloud as from its master.

We instruct it into being with our vision--touch
here, then there--scintillating the pond
to fullest splendor.

2

Love, you said, is a portrait of Hope
reaching into the ether, unsure
of what she grasps--what lies beyond
the painting, this canopy of blue? Up there,
no hand can touch her, no beloved
can obstruct her sight.

3

Lovers, when they separate, are
children again--with no one to cling to, no one
to keep them from their thoughts, they
descend into themselves, into that corpus of unknown
desires, and rise again, the hyacinth
unfolding on the water.