Make a song from these bones.
Nothing like it has been heard, the song
beautiful as the birds outside,
the bees in the balm tree petals
and the flowers, mine, which may one day fall
from the pages of a book
opened by a stranger.
Or you could find your way in
the bones of places traveled.
I have told you the story of the mountainside.
My life was there.
Walk your bones along
with mine, in any way you can.
Enter nerve, marrow, calcium, the archaeology of it
so ancient, never crossing the large river,
and think, what is the name of any life
with only five fingers,
the hands that grew grapes?
How much better the wine.
It comes close to you, this bottle, and if that makes you sing
drink it well, dear, dear human, a life so hard
and like the bone, it lasts so long.
Before you know it, you are walking on a dark road
going home with nothing
but a story, and with time
to tell it at last,
and maybe someone
remembers the name of this life
the story of the body, the walk.
Wouldn’t you love that one?