Gravity
Crimson red were the leaves and
wet were the lands and streets. Faulty
were the eyes that beheld your beauty
and empty were the arms that embraced you.
And even though wind in my ear whispers and
silver clouds above do quiver in my teardrops,
your touch remained forever just beyond my reach.
I confess, nights did pass
with sleeplessness; I burned candles, and flames
did blind my eyes. Creases in fabric became
my meditation, and light—the kind not seen, but felt;
white and pure,
Impossible and unbearable—
did pierce my closed, dreaming eyes. And yet,
your face, so unforgettable,
was impossible to remember.
I confess, into a field I went
into a meadow I wandered and
into a sky I looked.
I confess, my head I threw back
and of flying I dreamed.
Among clouds and birds I wished to be
the earth below I longed to see
further and further away from me—
but it was not to be.
And yet though all this the clock did tick;
the sun did move and its zenith cross
and into the sky I did not ascend
nor could your face remember.
Cold air I did breathe and water colder
did I taste; clouds and dust
and leaves and ceilings
did hide your face from view. Birds
I watched ascend; their eyes I saw
moist and pearly from venturing so near
the sun and on mountains tall
I gazed and wept, whose peaks, so close to heaven,
were swept with wind, and where ice
did crack and crumble; in the gusts
I hoped for salvation; of riding their wings I dreamed;
to be carried in their arms I longed.
Gravity it was to blame; I could feel him in each
and every step, and when I slept, his weight
did slowly bend and distort my limbs; his pressure
did squeeze and crack my temples and lower
my line of sight to the ground. The sky,
for which I reached and opened my chest,
he pulled me from and to my ankles
clung; from up there, in the endless blue
he held me, and from my sight of you.
Among clouds and birds I wished to be
the earth below I longed to see
further and further away from me—
but it was not to be.
