I will sit in the sun and write a poem,
sit right next to the shed leaf; in my hand
I shall take it, hold it up
and reflect the sun’s light onto you, onto bee,
onto planes cutting across sky,
carrying dreams across sea. I will sit
where I am sitting,
at the center of you and me,
at the core of the heart of the earth
and of the dusty things that rise from its depths:
the flowers that whisper their pollen
over hills and atop graves,
over soldiers and atop war,
over love and into naked sex
and violence splayed.
Each word I will write
will be an unerasable mark, a star of a star
wrapped in the darkness of space. Infinite
will be its song. Silent
its effect, but the waterfalls roaring
will draw from its darkness their breath.
I will draw from you what you draw from day,
experience in the manner of matter turned haze:
the prick of a thorn, the split of the flesh,
the soft bubbled blush
of a pulsing bead bled.
All is droplet and cloud,
and everywhere your name will slicken
streets and stones with the echo of your birth.
Hear it in the valleys! Hear it in the veins!
Hear it in the songs of heroes,
the mourner’s refrain.
I will honor you as you honor me,
as the world turns and sun blazes;
I will
sit right here, a poem
next to a leaf.
