an outward visible sign

scientifically i do not know
if i still possess a soul
but there was something that was carried along upon that thought
soul searching
soul craft
soul mate
soul singing
i can still remember all of it
how the sky curled around me and i knew myself in the very spot where i stood
and the trees ended in thousands
of fingertips lightly tracing lines
how the tall grasses
forgot that i could catch their whisper as they rose
and then lay flat under invisible passages of,
yes, soul searching winds until 30 birds lit up from the old pasture
could no longer keep from flight

A sort of journey in china

I set out one day to lose myself
i took a set of old china and dropped each piece
one by one
into the river
onto the street
upon the snow, the grass, the sheets

do you know how to fall? to fail?
to shatter because you have felt the immobile earth
press apart your hidden seams

to smack a yielding flow, buoyant,
unbalanced,
in slow motion slide sideways and spin
in wordless eddies on a verge where light is bent

to settle noiselessly, scattering the frail
innocent snow around your feet, a tiny scarring tempest,
push of descent and rush of air into the void of where you were


to make no real impression except to be nuzzled by
parted leaves of grass and turn the green below you into mud
from hiding light

to sit blank upon the bed except for lines of stylized scenes in blue
painted beneath impassive gloss. still i did not lose myself
though i knew better now the things i lost