Poet to Poet

early morning/
darkness/

Poet, old bag of bones
upside down,
what are you searching for
in poetry,
in meditation?

the mother you never had?

the child in you
that you did not conceive?

death?
ease from the fear of death?

Revelation?

dwelling in the house of the clouds
where you imagine
you once lived?

"Born alone,
we depart alone."

melancholy poet,
behind your clown face
behind your wise cracks-
how heady it is
to let the ideas rush to your pen.

but even upside down
you are sad.

Even upside down,
I think of our death.
Even upside down
I curse the emptiness.

(pause)

Meditating, poet,
on the immobile lotus,
my mind takes flight
like a butterfly
& dabbles in bloodred poppies
& purple heather.
Defying gravity,
Defying death

what makes you think
the riddle is better solved
upside down?

Blood rushes to your head
like images that come to fast
to write.

After a life held in the double grips
of gravity & time, poet,

After a headfirst birth
out of your mother's bowels
& into the earth,
you practice for the next,
you make your body light
so that in time,
feet first, poet
you will be born
into the sky.

I must close...take care, poet.