Vespers

Memory of myself arrived
In thick, curling smoke of copal tree resin
Jewel of tear hanging in eye

Spotted and strange houseplants
Mist in a temple
Nestled in today’s Metropolis
Caught, lurching
Final lift before the fall

Dissolution, dénouement
Riding easy in dead stillness
High tide for now

I recognize these hand’s gestures
Tying knots into red yarn
I recognize this sister, a stranger, my thighs
A future viewer feeling me

I’ve seen these shapes before,
In the sound of a voice
Chanting Vespers
Casting invisible lines
Prayers towards the rosy Belt of Venus
Bowing over East River

Smoke signals rise
Winding through unknown form
Winding to unknown future
Particles of the past
Visiting
Shapes of future cities
Weights of future laws
Cadence of future communication

Godspeed, eternal technologies, I trust wholly in thee:
Forever new wind
Red heart of fire
Wisdom of water
Memory of minerals

I am ancestor, now, in glimpses
Bright and fleeting
Light sparkling over the crest of a lake’s wave
Grains of sand turned glass in the Sun’s good time

Life echoes
Smooth pebble, tossed into a well
An echo and reminder
To future woman

Heed our call
Come and bathe
Naked of names, time, circumstance
In the waters
Of total freedom