rain rain rain

pain: a list

one: to throw everything into
its transformation from
a state, a noun-dom,
into an active principle:
i pain--as a verb--
i be pain--i pained.

a lonely transformation,
that's point two.
for decades, like
a brunette princess
entangled
in a hundred years of dreams,
i waited, incarcerate,
to be saved--to be pulled
from the endless flame--
to be separated
from what is in essence
myself--
by some constant hand
not my own.

that's over now,
or i try to see it as such.
the longing floe of ice,
its attendant flame,
the wave that passed
back and forth between them,
ends like
a leonard cohen song:
too many syllables,
too acoustically demonstrative,
but powerful in its sadness
anyway.

three--
what do i do
from here? where do i go?
how to breathe,
how to draw breath even
enough to speak?

my face is drawn white against itself.
when i close my eyes,
i see skin drawn in red.
my hair unbound
black as a river,
and, to borrow a conceit,
the stars have gone out
in it.

suffering is all around, caked
thick like unsettled tectonic crust,
point four.
my own mangled whimpers
deserve no notice
amidst the general
traffic.
those who died were beautiful,
they who live in sorrow are
lovely as the asphodel,
and i am neither.

five--
a turn away from silence;
a homecoming beyond sound.

there is a tree, its branch heavy.
a rotation toward the bough--
a selection of the fruit that calls my name.

as though we'd never parted.
look at me, pain,
red in my palm.

you are the only witness
to the moment
of this my devotion
by flesh.
i eat, and
your juice
runs down
my throat.

i am honed
and ready for you
as the sheath
the dagger--
strike me
like a match
and see
the spark
that
generates.


six:
conversation in
that desert at night
that unfolds in my mind--
no, you are not pain's.
no, you are not meant
to gather only pain.
yes, stay here.
for the moment stay here.
for the moment be this.
for the moment, see nothing
beyond this.

touch me, fire,
with your sweet blue lips.
touch me and tell me
of safety in your arms:
take me, pain--
grant me the gift
of agony.