Possibly

 

Possibly

 

There is a dreamer

all good conductors

 

know to look for

when the last stop is made

 

                        Christian Wiman

                        All Good Conductors

 

Possibly it’s not the body we look

back on one last time just

one last time after all

that was ever in it which is

to say breath which is to say

dreaming which is to say

the tongue lifted to the roof

of the mouth to make a sound

to swallow that sound the way

wind is swallowed how it pushes

itself through   

mountains & the cliffs of mountains

& the floors of mountains out on toward

the shore the salt of the water there

and the flie and the hides of all

 

the congregants stooping to

press their ears or jaws to the shell

of something pure so they can take it

in and all of this all of it is within

the skin of this woman who’s whole

soul was rising while she slept

and it lept and met the storm cellar

door of her bones and shouldered it

it was closed it was closed against

the twist of wind that became the textile

of the sky she was entwining

herself in and a fit and pitch

 

and glimpse finally lifting that lid—listen:

she was looking out and calculating

the math of her gambles and the days

that came after were deliberations of

the distance of her longitude of birth

to the yonder port rising east

 

where the sun comes

from.  She was casting her fist

of dice.  Aw shit, dying ain’t nothin’ some-

one said to her once, dyin’ ain’t nothin’

but letting those old bones go, & flyin off

before they hit the ground.