The Ambition of Meaning

the ambition of meaning


pressing into the red hills
the rain like raw whips
abandoned of flesh
emptied of
empathy
knots
cut

how
else to
bind wounds
to step into the air
of brilliant stars unblinking
she who washes the canyons of
absence (who were these lost rivers)

bound to my own wanting gouged peremptorily
into my soul by a god i cannot recognize
save in the noose of that which drags
what cannot be: mutilated corpses
tied to my back: o memory
i wake & wake & still
the absence waits

out there in here
turning ever
at my face
melting
heat to
ghost
ice

sleepless
the rooms
ribbon into
waves tines
snaking loose
from their rope
of solidity: illusion

crouched low in
the shadow of
every joy a
flightless
half man
nailing
knots


Richard Lance Williams

Posted over on More Poetry