THE DIVER IN SERVICE OF SCULPTURE

            as the deepest experiences
            evade me

 spread through and over me
            like light

            I absorb
she nourishes while
while offering nothing
            to bring me back to reality

            hips tilted forward

all I could recapture
everything remembered badly
words clumsy and inadequate at best
as I put the pen down
and arrive at a different place
            by imagining
            strolling at their side
                        beyond the power of the precise
briny shores  cattle  purple sky  
too subtle the intimacy
            to be incorporated into my language
could not recall
dimmed most oddly
entered into my essence
            to cherish and to feed
laden with sensation so fine
            only a repeat dose
            invokes it

from sun-flayed meadows
to New York City
    green-tinged lights of the campus 
     misplaced in those halls of ivy 
hard grind of headlines,
has been here set down
            so her presence brings
            a different tale to me

hobble toward  a taxi
pass homes with concrete driveways
                        come into the terminal

            could be no other
            could not frame into words.        
            but begin to understand how much nearer
inflamed
sit still
impossible to convey
            can’t take the flight away
though the body absorbs earthly nourishment
            leave her shaking with the tears
leave the brass-headed bed
            most of what I had heard recycled
like my speedy heels
   the rest    the main part,
a purer form of memory
now as tanned as sand


desiring mind
slightly bowed grass
                                    over me
physical touch is distant
            portion most
            remembered of the colloquy
scratched into her coffin lid
she would run as if she were
            shiny
shy head tilted and wrinkled,
like sun glistening off a train track
            sleep came

so she’s gone at last
as softly as would a cat
or a song from a late night movie

patter on silver heels 
stolid little stone walls
sleight-of-hand
suddenly chubby
            with soft lips
            taking off to wander the hills
            or making coffee
tear down the clouds,
tear evaporates
in a tangle of heather and sumac

as it were filtered through
            the mere turning on a lamp
            fire tipping luminal
sense of fierce reality
wide lawn of green monotone
wind      birdsong
            thecoreofthisbeing
therapy is the words
of those who’ve been
beyond state lines
            to write down the dream
            in transcendental order
            eschew unnecessary rescue
            wary of nightmares to come


John Grey