Ask Me Again.

I’d create a universe in a stairway
scale poles and slide on telephone wires
to fill your sky with stars
that choose not to empty or expire.

I think I may be lost on Eliot
wondering where my Ezra’s gotten to again
caught in the wasteland we’d presume
(perhaps she’s even been consumed).

I’d sit you down, TSE;
And we’d discuss over coffee, over tea
I’d try to explain to you
the limits of the sea.

You know me well enough by now, you’d know
What I’d risk for certain half deserted streets
to be able to relate to you the ocean that lives
within a body warm, on pale linen sheets

How white makes a serpent’s shape
that curls around ankles, around thighs
around the lines we’d name as heaven
if ever we’d been afforded anything like time.

We’re foolish in seeking claims
upon a siren’s song;
we’re nothing but acrobats
and we might be wrong.

The voice is enough, you understand?
if it approximates the merit of the ocean
and the sea that but in dreams
we dare attempt to touch.