Volume

Strange sense of volume –
as if the day, now that you’ve let it be,
has shown you what it always was and is,
will be: eternity. Sunstar-light fills
the palace of the afternoon – almost
with solace: unexpurgated quiet: generous –

accessible. You wrestled with the city for
an hour or two: subways, sidewalks,
grumbling mumbling Aztec gods
and African aristocrats and Slavic lords:
banging in and out of banks and pharmacies
and supermarkets – awkward and annoying:

and deploying their somatic weaponry –
elbows, shoulders, knees: all pushing,
bumping, kicking – honking horns –
an edgy cold sharp wind along the torn frayed
sides of New York City’s wild abiding
urgencies: which were your own. Today

you weren’t sure if life meant more than
grabbing for a bone to gnaw on,
greedily, alone. You tried: your volatilities
all fried you: impatient for the edge
to cut. But now the door to that has gently
shut, and here this volume is

again: a modal bluesy clarinet extends –
somewhere suspends – the fine trajectory
of breath you just let go – and holds it up,
aloft, and sends it on – up, to,
and through whatever flow has in this
flooding starlight called to you.




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