Dead Man, Thinking

    Snow geese in the light of morning sky，

    exactly at the start of spring.  I was

    looking through the cracks of the blinds at my future which seemed

    absent of parades， for which I was grateful，

    and only yesterday

    I watched what an April wind could do

    to a body wrapped in silk，

    though I turned my eyes away，

    the way the teacher says，

    once the beauty was revealed.

    ii

    How long it takes to die， in the fifty-fifth year

    is what I thought about today.

    I told some truths so large， no one could bear to hear them.

    I bow down to those who could not hear the truth.

    They could not hear the truth because they were afraid

    that it would open a veil¹ into nothing.

    I bow down to that nothing.  I bow down to a single red planet

    I saw in the other world's sky，

    spinning，

    as if towards some

    fleshy inevitability².

    I bow down to the red planet. I bow down

    to the noisy birds， indigenous³ to this region.

    Only sorrow can bend you in half

    like you've seen on those whose loves have gone away.

    I bow down to those loves.