La Época en que Hay Olvido, and: Sleeping Animal, and: Gift

La Época En Que Hay Olvido

Sometimes I enter the small chambers of the God of Forgettingand take my place at his feetand kneeland bow my head.

And I say into the ground that bears both of us:I need you—now.

You have listened to the supplicationsof tyrants and dictatorsand kings

—in my lifetime alone, countless wishes.

But there is already a country renamed for its suffering,and an altar upon whichthe innocent secretlyundo the knotswith their teeth.

All I have to offer is rotting carrotsand a basil plantdying in its water.

I used to eavesdrop on the priests who moonlight as assassinsto make sure my namewas not in their diaries.

How many people have come outsidefrom their desperate invocationsand self-mutilation

to see the wonder for themselves? Is it true?Are the juncossingingin the dogwoods?

Have the dancers removed their right shoes?Are they hopping aroundon both hands?

Yes, it is true. We are closing our eyes. To forecast deathwe gather with strangers,like this one womanin the mustard coatsitting on a park bench.

Her son has opened a small blue box stuffed with peanutsand he pours them into her one cupped handso a few fallfor the sparrowsand all the while

the chainsaw is singing to each of us: STAY! STAY AS LONG AS YOU LIKE!NO ONE CAN KEEP YOU!and the boy—I told you—is trying to fly.

He first lifts one wing, then lets both go. Nowwatch the little onetake off

leading his enormous dragon made of water and lightby its silver leash. See

the long liquid flock of muscleglisteningin the child's fist.

Sleeping Animal

From here I can see the childrenrunning across the long field

for no other reasonthanthey are fast.

What shall I pray fortoday?

Wealth? Good looks?Youth?

In my third lifeI'm supposed to fall

into the earsof a puma

and hold my handsup inside

the caverns of its skullto touch

the night songscoming in.

Oh, second life!You were not the best,

and still howlucky I was

to have no given mapbut a language

to aska sleeping animal

if its teeth achedafter the last hunt.

Gift

When you holda slice

of freshly cutred melon

to my lips,I drink

as muchas I eat

And though we givethe same name

to every incarnationof this vine

the taste of this oneis specific

(for it must carrythe savory

hint of metal,the particular salt

of your forefingerand thumb)

to which I sayGive me

the whole thingthe history of it

If there is a warburied

in this giftI'll eat that too

Like most fruit it holds its own

water,which once was

rain or glacieror dew extracted

and gatheredover time

after a massacreof elk

or the slowextinction of fish

Let mekiss it all back

into your tongueto say

LookI'm real

in a worldfull of figments

I didn't know griefcould cool

a fever bodybut here

you and I aretaken

in each other's mouthsbecoming

the temperatureof the sea