And as for me, each day now seems
to be an unfolding golden field
in which I walk well-lit,
search each blade of grass
and find songs hidden in the root,
where, having spent years wound out
tight and thin as string, I could,
with a song borrowed from the river,
call down the sky, have it sing me slack,
and all those wild horses at the shadow
of the tree-line, twitching flanks
and flaring eyes, would follow me
along the bank, wade into the water,
watch the river fold its arms around us,
grow gentle as the flow,
could raise these hands to flaring faces,
hold palms upward to the light,
cup the falling sky and hold it out
for them to drink and this would
be something more than metaphor,
not just a harking back to myth
or some nostalgic ‘better time’
when all we had worth saying
was said in deep-blue quiet,
was said with mouths pressed
against each other’s palms
or written on our spines by light
that bled from night into the room
and how some nights, still,
when you rest your hands
against me, I feel remade entirely,
singing as the hole in Hafiz’ holy flute
and if your hands would lift me
high enough I’d press myself
against the sky
as a ‘concert from the mouth
of every creature’ sings-
and all these holes I keep finding
in my skin would bleed not noise
but light.
The lines ‘concert from the mouth / of every creature’ belongs to Hafiz
Simon Kindt 