a corner turning
lilting with your voice
a tilt of some slim void
a simple sentiment
a jaunty crease that reaches up
staining something empty in me
hinting at a truth
as soon devoured as devout.

your own light could shed a path for you
and keep you from your misery
but viscerally
your hands could reach inside of me
to touch what you should know.

12/18/2006

Author's Note: The tone by the end feels hollow to me, but I guess its appropriate. I can't seem to find any passion in these poems but i'll keep looking. I've been told I shouldn't avoid this place so long but I feel like a fish . My Dad was a fisherman and I remember those near-death eyes of salmon after salmon as they slowly went delirious and suffocated in the ice. My Dad would smile and haul them in and they'd all go down into the big "ice pit" on his modest commercial fishing boat. When you poked them they'd flap and snap and then too late realize they've wasted their last bits of energy on a weak offense that would never save them. You could almost watch them regret their last futile move, watch them question you instinctively without even realizing it, as if to wonder "why poke me like this... when this... is all... I have left?" Only clearly without words or even coherent thought. So these words in me are poking and I feel just like a fish.

What shall I name this poem? It's about a smile i saw on his mouth today, and the difference between what a mouth shows, eyes see and a hand can feel. It doesn't feel right to call it something after a fish, and everything else sounds tot cliche.

Posted on 12/19/2006
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