Words don’t progress
you can’t break them
and if you try
to hold them
they dissolve
into the ether
of the human brain

You can’t engage
in thrall to spume
as seeing not
but only as
as in a play
upon a turn
where once I
twirled a syllable

Life’s a stage
development upon a theme
struck by word in hand
a handy word
blunt in perception
wide in consciousness
that stills the tears
it stirs

And when the world sleeps
in broken words ––
parts and partials ––
then such syllable
and letter force
in pent reverbs a token

Words part
and wound
beyond count
which is why
lamentation
is wistful
and regret
charade

Like lamp at dawn
torch at noon
feather in windstorm
boot on a horse
waterdrop for ocean
a jewel for a crown
broken string
for a broken lute
walled city at ruined midnight

We weep
with joy and
laugh with
fear as steep
as a well
to the center
of earth
and as high
as a kike
on skid row

Tambourines tap
bugles blow
soldiers march
into driving snow:
sort out the lessons
suss what you know
tumble into
perception’s show

Of a time yet to come
if come there be
hidden
in the folds
of the veils
of a glow

Nearly there
so far to go