What name can I give you?
Surely there are none
and it is pointless to try,
like giving names to
celestial bodies,
or quantum particles.  

I thought I could capture it,
that the gaps would be filled in,
like space between
crocodile teeth
clasped on a zookeeper's hand.
I thought
If I could paint like Wyeth,
I'd have my Helga.

What name do I give you?

Maybe Odessa,
laughing on the crest of a wave,
dragged by purple currents,
among gulls on Earth,
and storms in the sea?

Perhaps Athena,
with gleaming eyes
and an owl in your hand?

Or Queen Maeve,
raw with beauty,
buried upright
facing your enemies?

Infeasible,
but it must be something,
for the shake of necessity,
So as to call out when
loitering on lake's edge,
or from across a room
when I see you there,
uncanny as my reflection
in a convex mirror.

I'll call it out.

It's not that I want to,
but that I do;
Just as frogs jump,
just as the tongue
pushes on the aching tooth,
I see Venice in
cheekbone crevices,
smell Vienna in a tangle of hair.

This tropism is
an elephant stomping
the marrow out of me,
and it's alright,
it feels good,
and Wisdom is her name.