Two Poems

Robert Kelly

INCLUSIONS

The amber in chamber

glows against the wall

opposed to the window.

Sit where I can see you.

Your hair. The chair

painted yellow

(like that van Gogh

empty bedroom)

long ago looks

golden now. You now.

You now. You know

how things have turned

into shadows of us,

thousands of years to

take on our shapes.

I love this room,

it understands my eyes.

FOR STEVEN HOLL

The architect is everywhere.

So many solutions

to no problem, like poetry.

Imagine a house, walk in.

Your shadow leads the way

mornings. That sort of house.

Tilt the floor a little

away from the moon,

you’re man enough for house

woods highway storm cloud

churchbell in the dining room

the sea-sunken bed.

Sometimes number theory

is an agony,

five miles in another’s shoes,

your shadow scrapes the floor

you know it knows things

you’ll never tell

no critic knows—

the way a shadow breaks

at the first stair step

a simple bird

bounces off a window

stunned flies away.

This is what a house must be

the rule of three

divided by eternity

we have to know it

to let it go,

a house too is stunned

by where it stands,

wake it

with revelry and prose,

hibiscus, spandex,

the swimming pool

must have no shape

but water alone,

you have it all now,

have her in your arms,

the form of water

wakes up the mind.

You build of light—

footsteps follow.