Gold Never Wants

gold never wants


sky brushed imperfectly in shades of
a white November—
imagine the floors of heaven frozen
or later black ice
& she presses the search to discover heat rises
or the antlered deer claiming we must drown

how she found a silver coin in a dry Texas creek
limestone broken before the sea could matter
or the bed of a rusty truck with cords
of cedar & silk & gold ceilings

she thought how bleak to lose thought
or perhaps we were just too weak
to hold to what we had or
maybe that was just

we had our place & time
the same way the same turn
as any startled man & his ghost
with the sheer stubborn bone of a cat

how she says everything she thinks
& it must be the silence as he promised
if the code fell apart
& the flak of exploding
stars or letters of questions
without dead weight

where is the onset of the what is not there
undoing the done that was never undone
or the fire that cooks the past as it will be
when the sound of angels groan like men
who have nothing of what she cannot take

the dead are always with us
they hear everything
we cannot say
or will

or if you finger in
the point of
distance—
there she is

how perfectly clear what draws her draws him
& a quartet is half what the red diary
of a god matters to a mall of drunk Roman soldiers:
she’sin’it

****

one hive living one hive dead

coiled in a perfect piano
slow waves rolling
one

two

* * * *

breath of lonely skies
crimson & lead
dissolving

geese in gold sheaves
the obviousness of
butcher paper

what stone wants
the press of
knots

(strings cut)

or when she said that
certain sorrow had
nothing to give

how high clouds
circled forever
with no rain

copper tracing
the paths
of fire

(a voice that pulls ghosts)

she promised then
she would check
with a doctor

how she did not
unwrap what
he gave her

how so many
years lay
unused

(what is a father’s house)

* * * *

how she held one long note

honey in the first snow
typed out the order of time
& posted it twice by accident

twice

* * * *

surprised

how death
so swiftly pulls

the soul to her breast

cool waters sweet milk
soft strokes for the cheek

the growlings white—distant

shh . . . springs, she says . . .
rocks breathing . . .

& things . . .
break—
drip

honey

falls
slowly
from tips

of dead twigs

bees
abandon
graying hives

he gathers them
inside a photograph

how he never sees the frame
but hears the sound
of the comb

a crispness gone soft

a certain swelling
in the flange . . .

her hair
gold


Richard Lance Williams

Posted over on More Poetry