I know only too well where I have to go this evening if I want
to meet up with sadness. Its availability is surprising –
its diary full of empty spaces – when I am
the one concerned. We agree to meet
above everything. The wheel rises, slow
and silent like a huge cosmic clock
that the wind operates from time to time.
Far-off, submerged in the waters of night, the city
shines with its golden scales,
thousands of dumb mouths opening and closing
while they swim through life’s icy currents.
How long have I been going round on this wheel,
now so close to the world, now so far away?
Like an astronaut lost in space, I search for a cable
that may connect me to the breathing
of others, warm oxygen for the beseeching lungs.
I look at my right hand, I look
at my left hand, and it takes me years to cover the distance.