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At some point you are handed your life

as a jigsaw puzzle

then

for the next number of decades

you try assembling the pieces

until

the afternoon sun

illuminates the picture obliquely

today everything fits

passers-by admire your work

but

no matter the subject

there is always

one red

heart-shaped piece

left unused

and

you wonder

if you kept it out

to complete this assignment

or

was there never a spot for it

at all.

The Beginning and the End

If you went back to someplace like the beginning

you might find something like the word.

Not the actual word, but a sprout,

a sound that sounded like a word.

If you went back to someplace like the beginning

you might discover the first idea

and there would be an inspired tone associated,

a texture of consonant and vowel

used to convey from lip to ear. 

If you went back to someplace like the beginning

you might learn of the way sound grew

from noise to noun

and eventually, to verb.  The thing, then the action

and the story they told together.

If you went, you might stand there,

mute as the mud at your feet,

marveling at the efforts, the countless repetitions

of utterance, the rise and fall of voices

stressing and un-stressing their songs

of almost meaning.

And since that beginning 

while the words themselves have grown greater

than those who merely speak them, 

as the words have continued to evolve, light-like,

what have we done with them?

Is this remarkable present day brighter

or darker for our writings

our speech, or our song?

For tomorrow, we won’t leave anything

but our bones

and our words, strewn out behind them

like dry ashes.

Last update : 08-06-2007 05:01

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