There’s a softness in all moving
things. It travels. All you see
has gone, and goes again. So fluid
is the body; so fluent. As water
speaks form to a river, love from
a stranger, so total is a voice—it
carries a room outside itself, cars
beyond their highway. You:
I carry you, too. There is kindness
in repose. The thought that
someone might touch me. For
evening comes soon on these mesas,
late October, an arctic chill
settling in from Labrador. The
sound of hell in Asia, aircraft
hourly over this cabin, over sharp-
toothed mountains. And these, too
are soft. As all things are soft.
Inside hell is water. Within ice
is the warmth of a well. And all
that has frozen, even the heart, still
travels with your name. The man
you reached for in the dark. The
woman you sought in her
desperate silence. The one
who pulls you now, to a midnight
lake, your body like a small
thrown stone. See how the ripples
move away—and call. This
is the secret of light.