Someone Coming Back

Now that the summer has emptied

and laughter’s warned against possessions,

and the swans have drifted from the rivers,

like one come back from a long journey

no longer certain of his country

or of its tangled past and sorrows,

I am wanting to return to you.

When love affairs can no longer be distinguished from song

and the warm petals drop without regret,

and our pasts are hung in a dream of ruins,

I am wanting to come near to you.

For now the lark’s song has grown visible

and all that was dark is ever possible,

and the morning grabs me by the heart and screams,

‘O taste me! Taste me please!’

And so I taste. And the tongue is nude,

the eyes awake; the clear blood hums

a tune to which the world might dance;

and love which often lived in vaguer forms

bubbles up through sorrow and laughing, screams:

‘O taste me! Taste me please!’