(wake up) not asleep, but reading,
(write) she sits the edge of my bed,
tilts her head, waits. silence. (think it
to know). Sylvia, i am tired.
(the write will you), but how,
(ask the sky). and she stays,
to feel, asking cry (I know). pulls
what i push down (inside rain),
closing windows on day (tumble words),
and in sleep of dark, my name, cloud
whisper, pen gripped unwritten (Sylvia),
fly, write us both home (again).
This day the glass cracked blue,
the mirror was a window, no longer
empty space looking back into churning seas.
I hear you shriek, and shriek again,
this time it’s real: the uncut grass,
the bees and balloons, the shadows
and the moon. And you, you are the embryo,
the gift, the color of the sky that blooms.
There is a space for love.
But you haven’t gone, Sylvia.
You still whisper to me in colors, and when
I say “not good enough,” you turn my mirror
into a window. The words you send I write. You know.
I feel. You sent me lost, so I could be found. Sending
me your darkness, so I have hollow bones and cry
shadow tears, and you say ~ write. I try, Sylvia.
Don’t swirl me lost.
and then Sylvia said you must.
squeezed my hand until it wrote.
and you. and all. now was before
to still. swirling know into colors.
and colors were feel. colors
of the core but not time. moon
felt. she said stay but there was
no leave. inside the sky. within you.
you know. nothingness is really all.
here is wonder. open. through.
and now hold. rise from ash to moon.
watch. outside in. begin.
Talking to the Clouds 