I Am the Work

Watching you stretch, I saw
in that simple, basic behavior all
the many yous that have stretched:
the tiny child,
the scampering girl,
the inward adolescent,
the young woman exulting in her body,
the mother after a long day,
the artist, the writer up from her desk—
all different and all the same and together
in the same energy, the same stretch.

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I never read to her
—the patch under her skin
—the terror
—the birdlike cries.
I write of her now,
but she will never know.
But I do what I can,
help in the only way I know how,
to assuage her mortality.

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Fat pipes and beams of green-gray emit a machine light of industrial clatter in silence smooth but completely dull and wet with breath. Tiles also smooth and clattery with puddles of hard water spattering into rubbery haze when pinky feet slap. Reverb reverb voices and chirps and the crunch of water again and back and [...]

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He sees the giant face of the Buddha, newly carved into the rock
where only a few years ago he and his men
had dynamited that ancient idol
of long-dead infidels.
How could this be here again, he wonders.
How could it be made so quickly, and worse to think,
who is bringing this monstrosity back to his land?
He approaches, his [...]

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When I look
At an author’s face
On the flap
I try to gauge
His intelligence
Or her humor.
I try to see
If I can sympathize
With the mind inside.
I find I
Distrust the pretty face
Distrust the haunting look
Distrust the smug confidence
Distrust the distracted distant gaze
Distrust the trappings of literary acumen.
I trust the authors
Who are looking at me,
Who seem to be saying hello.

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