Ash of my thought’s eyes fall
like a view
from up high and the rain’s
claws
become old songs playing
scratchily
against stained panes of a
glass vice—
I am only touched briefly,
intangibly
and lifted out of myself with
a tweezers pull
My ant-body separates like
oil and water
leaving me to bleed a rainbow
and swirl
Curling like a singed strand
of hair, the fingers
of conch wombs let go, let me
dilate in the wind’s arms
Sand melts me crystal clear
and the ache is gone—
My welt-red newborn memories
gasp in the dark for air.
NJP 2/12/2003