from "Seraph"

V

Uriel, when we met I was small and shakenin a sweat-drenched bed. I wasthe pitcher of water to wash unwilling heads,I was set down to be filled and I was lifted again.My father said, you must give the people mercyand the Lord said, mercy has yet to come. Uriel, when we met my eyes were turned back in my skull,searching for some small light to call on for comfort.It was you who entered the shuffling sheets of my mindthrough that tiny point of brightness.It was you who came to lay the wing of your hand upon my ribs.I do not know if the Lord lifted his leaden head that night,but I saw his beautiful horrible prints on your backwhen you moved out to wash in the white lightcast between the slatted blinds. I saw the heavy hangingof your yet unused sex between the awful pillars of your thighs.I saw that your hands were worn from the worryof wrestling Jacob, from being heldtoo close to the unbearable flame. Uriel, that nightyou thought I was blind, a borne kittenthat wants its mother's tongue. You placed your hands upon meto stay the shaking and appearedas all things are seen, a beam of light in a roughened robe.Uriel, you forgot that in each vessel of the Lordthere is a heart, and in that heart is a room, and in that roomis a seat where one can lean against the window and watch.