Lesser Leaf
I make my thought of this, my own volition –
whereby I know, wherefore, I mean,
not without a heart to seem,
not too far or near away –
that is what I thought to create
in this, my mind most animate,
and creating, verily,
made my ‘verse’s merrily
enacted course divorce itself not from itself,
but sustaining a better gaining
of that blessed simulacrum, the similarity
of that – this – the – singularity
that is to me:
yes, is even – in me, through me,
joys me, every day it can,
so that my variety of superimpositions
upon this, my inquisitions,
might show to what the end I seek
(if end I possess the more)
will turn – but yet I have none,
no, no other, than it to find,
my self, my soul, my stay, my self –
resting lightly on the stair,
slipping trippingly with easy lightness
of brightness supreme, too canny, coy,
too lightly woven, too far pleasing
to be conceivable,
though perceivable to some, I mean,
and so deceivable in their indecision.
But yet back to my elision, and to write
of how, ‘til now, I’ve met nowhere
a better verse or a better pair
than that one that I’d find nowhere
but in the unanimity of consanguinity,
in, in brief, the lesser leaf
of one who speaks to me in tongues,
leading me up the ladder rungs,
and to me solace brings
in how birds – how they wing
through air most idoneus –
not to always say “I am sorry”
and yet always to say it –
to elide it with ourselves for whatever ill –
still, ever, to think “Why? Why?”
and into the night to cry for stillness,
to smile at peace and pray for illness
while always furthering gentle somethings,
gentle someones, for the fear
that we’ll not otherwise know
how close it is, to come to all, to everything
in this, our life, never to know,
never to know, never to know
that the brief intaglio upon a locked container
of the ventaglio that is its maintainer
is more beautiful far when seen
by no others than the ones for whom it is intended,
yet with always the hand ready to be extended
to, yes, pick up the bottle,
beautiful, truly, in its own way –
yes, and even, and even to say,
and even to think, believe it so,
even without the strength, but faith to know
and apt in verse – in ‘verse – in poesy,
pure joy, pure free –
that, that it could ever always be just so
as to –
be:
this the beauty in which I stray.
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