The Present Tense

THE PRESENT TENSE
(please click to watch)

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You wake up and the room is empty
the light is out

There’s that high-pitched ringing in your
ears or in the air of cosmos

Somewhere a crescent-shaped boat is
rocking back and forth on triangular waves

in pale moonlight

Somewhere a child is growing a new tooth
a salamander a new tail

Someone is making up a story to fascinate women
mislead the police or

write a book

Everything comes clean in the end
even the end

and the end is near
at both ends

which meet
under God’s tablecloth

where the feast is being set out
in golden ewers on sparkling trays

fruits like you’ve never seen
sweetmeats of indescribable hue

shimmering as they transform into the
most gorgeous music and

back again

Come on there’s still
time to catch it

Your life hasn’t gotten
that far away from you

The room is empty
but your heart has a pillar of flame

from which a phoenix launches its
renewal in a fireworks of ashes

Worlds within worlds
in this empty room

in the present tense
that never slackens

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5/11/2010 (from In Constant Incandescence)

Categories: Poems