says the messenger. Can you feel it? It’s everywhere. Give me your hands.
I look down for them. The palms are on fire. Actions
curdle in them—my will turns
to smoke. I can still feel
the plums they reached for once, how the fingers cupped them, there was
no irony, anger, pity, metamorphoses—no hereafter that was not this minute, right
here, this next-on
minute,
the one in which I could raise the fruit and
taste. And know. What did you know. I am afraid. No, what
exactly. The angel still trapped in the garden hears us I think. It weeps. Hear it? There’s a wheel
it’s on
it’s on
it can’t get off. Birds initiate rituals beyond us all, they screech
what could be instructions, and then, just before the end of day, there is
song. Yes the forests of dust whirled round us even then.
We knew these were the last years of water.
Anyone could tell.
All you had to do was be alive and you knew how large the end was, how empty of
mercy, you wouldn’t even bother to turn around
to see how close the storm…
The messenger is getting impatient.
Maybe I should lift my hands off these keys.
The smoke rising from them is running away with the music,
the singed skin making its own beseeching chords.
There are highs and lows.
Hear them?
Everything’s aiming for eternity….
Dear rain,
my hands are on fire one version of this goes,
the empire burning-on in these human fingers, which sprouted from us
so early on in the story—
they stopped digging graves, began digging foundations, there was
no shade in the day, none, the main idea became
resurrection, as if that could eventually
cool us down,
this civilization seeking nothing but kindling—
here comes the furrow, the wheel, the dam on the riverfall,
here comes the spilling of blood into soil
that it might sprout fantastic
fruit, here comes the
harvest, that delirium, the crashing of want into
more want—now the crushing of
fruit, our new-fangled blood, & the lashes meted out, the numbers &
letters, the counting &
recounting. Is this
enough? My hands itch deep in their palms. All the coins
that have slipped through them
burn.
I touch my mouth with my aching hand. Its skin is
ash.
Are we alone.
And now the words begin to rise & bring their
currency. They will cover the land with maps, with
deeds. I run my finger on the name of
the mountains, I
the mountains, I
slide it gently to wash itself off
in the sea.
I touch where the name of the ocean sits on its map—
where the steppes release fields,
where the fields release
wheat, oil, spice—the mules & cannons arrive, the urgent rare metals, bacteria,
longitudes & latitudes—the gentle straits, sea-lanes, troughs
all sitting there under
the smoldering paper.
And I cross them out. It is so easy.
I will not let the containers pass through today.
I clench my hand around
this pen.
I staunch the current,
the goods. Oh my hands,
treaties bloom from you,
the night is out there with all those rips in its veils, the stars throwing down their
reckless bets—there & there—did you see them—will we survive—
in here we have our inks, our documents,
we bend all night over our miraculous sums.
The messenger has been waiting all this time in the corner.
He’s not asked for water, he’s barely mentioned
eternity—& even then
only with a smile…
The flames are just licking my fingertips now.
He can tell so easily we are almost done.
I watch as my hands come together & join.
They are tempted by all that heat left by corpses & heroes—
will they pray? will they reach for another fruit,
this time from a garden where knowledge is not the crop?
What is the crop.
What is this hunger.
Nothing slaked it.
Nothing nourished it.
I wonder if there’s anyone else in here with me now,
it would be nice to wash in the stream out there
together,
to have the weight lift off us together,
to watch it float away, dust on water, in moonlight,
to lift our hands full of water & wash out
our eyes
& imagine the sky, the year, the appointment with
eternity,
to splash in this spring
& imagine the sea.
I look out the window to squint it all in.
We are smack in the middle of history I
gather,
so busy, the blank books stacked for us to fill them with
questions,
barely visible helmets gleaming outside as they march—though it cld just be fins
breaking
the surface.
I hope to see a tree bud-out again.
I lift this gift of gods and dip its nib in night-sky condensation,
in the centuries of salt-spray brought back as joy
by our long-gone
pilgrims
from that long-gone sea.
I will turn this page to the top of the next one.
To begin again.
To find my way to composing
our answer.
They came a long way.
They’ve been waiting forever.