Poem
Potosi, 1999 (prose poem)
We descended the Andes' barren razor top and saw stars---multitude upon multitude of incandescent grains of rice on jet---and your divinity was undeniable, more palpable than the llamas we passed, herded off to be sacrificed to the mines. I listened to love songs, hallucinogens for an attempted mystic high. My desire is unruly, as unstable as the drunk who drove us down the Bolivian road---cliff side, no rails. More days than years pass; I am down the mountain, alone across borders. Rivers don't flow silver from mines and the stars are far and few. Meeting you is like that, too---in another time and another place---in the mountains, your signature stamping ground (though sometimes I see your face in the eyes of Tamil children and elderly Ojibwa).
Sacred Places
Wisdom died in the green wood,
Words on my lips withered to rose petals
And leaves---were plucked to earth.
You followed just far enough to breathe,
And you sang:
She is the heat, the waves, the wind,
Green and growing behind the hedge she trims.
No mistake, no mistake,
No one knows her whims or cares.
They are her own.
© 2006 Copyright held by the author.