There are times when one might wish to be nothing
But the plain crease and budded nipple
Of a breast, nothing but the manner in the lay
Of an arm across a pillow or the pressure of hips
And shoulders on a sheet. Sometimes there is a desire
To draw down into the dull turn of the inner knee, dumb
And isolated from the cognizant details of any summer night,
To be chin and crotch solely as the unrecorded, passing
Moments of themselves, to have no name or place but breath.
If wished enough, it might be possible to sink away
completely,
To leave the persistent presence of pine trees brushing
Against the eaves, loons circling the lake,
Making an issue of direction; to sink away, remaining
Awake inside the oblivion deep within a naked thigh,
To open the eyes inside the blindness of a wrist, hearing
Nothing but the deafness in the curve of the neck.
It would seem a perfect joy to me tonight
To lie still in this darkness, to deny everything
But the rise in the line of ankle or spine, ignoring
The angles of walls establishing definable spaces,
Ignoring the clear, moon-shadow signals of specific
Circumstance, to recognize no reality but the universal
Anonymity of a particular body which might then be stroked
And kissed and fondled and worshipped without ever
knowing
Or caring to ask by whom or where or how it was given
Such pleasure.
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