Something rattles in the soul.
It must be paid attention -
it is the soul, the only sure thing -
and rattled in return.
Slow begins the dance of tongues and hard news.
I learn a thing I never wished to learn.
Afterwards,
a dance of tongues in the ensuite
begins a sudden rapture of claiming.
Nails mine, skin mine
to make a pink impression on.
Bile in the back of the throat, mine.
Fear of death, mine. Oaths and oaths,
mine, too. An exchange of humility,
knee for a knee. The rigid wall at your back.
The wall at your back.
The night which enriches
bluer out of the blue air,
not the action of
the world moving at all.
The particles of water in a birdbath divide,
decide among themselves
to marry each to each, to reproduce.
They become an ocean.
They drown the birds.
My mouth fills with feathers,
teeth itch with the tiny mites
running between the shafts.
I am a bell, and you are a country.
I am a bell and sound from far away.
Hands touch the broken vase in her parts, the toes,
the eyelash, the sunken wreck, the crowd of dead,
the treasure.
They say
all this
as if the map was drawn
and burned
and came again
in char from the tablecloth
to all our wonder.
A single miracle can last for weeks in the mouth. Sometimes centuries.
I will spend eighteen days in the void of grace.
What begins as a pain in my shoulders
will grow into a tree and bury me.
I will want promises, promises, promises.
(water, water, water)
I will never be satisfied.
Looking always for permanent loss it becomes easy to simply
misplace.
Your caution leads to strange decisions.
You put your keys in the fridge.
I would like to say I knew the words:
I cut the lock of hair, I drew the blood.
The hex was removed by faith and chaste reflection
but everywhere I look, there is a confusion
of hungry birds and beggars
and I forget the spell,
or what chaste reflection even is.
Anyways, something breaks. Not my doing.
Suddenly, I am just noticing sky again.
I am transcribed back into English.
My first decision is to wash my car,
and next,
to learn what faith meant to anyone.
Charmed, is it?
Something rattles in the soul.
It must be paid attention -
it is the soul, the only sure thing -
and rattled in return.
It has nothing, really, to say.
It only rattles.