Something Else, I Think

I forgot to turn on the light.
It’s too dark to read,
Much too dark to see,
And the switch unclicked so far away…
I enjoyed what I got.
Many an epitaph in those words:
I enjoyed what I got,
And got absurd-
But I’ve been a woman
Of many words,
And there’s a kind of toil the life compels-
Not the calloused-hand groans,
The sore, stretched joints
That in lying still
Is its own reward
But the discontent review,
The scouring, sieving, searching moans
Looking to see
If new exists,
And if the old is home
Or may ever be.
The wanderer, clutching a pen
Instead of a penny
Aware of the broken harbors
No soul repairs-
Alive on a dare,
A daring, wild-faced hope
That runs into the dinner party,
Fully in-swing and halfway through,
In bare feet and foreign tongue,
Cognizant of the madness,
And surveys the crowd
Looking for the One worth attending-
Alive on a dare-
Some amateur experiment
In Truth and the limitless potential
Of the Infinite.
While weeping, grateful-
Desperately grateful
Like the finger-ribbed mongrels
Hip bones as hinges
Whimpering and licking the earth
After a morsel of kindness
Grateful
For the sudden beauty
Breaking new over wasted ages:
The stumbling amnesia
The pitching rages and refusals
And then something beautiful
Washes the world clean again.
Persistent tides
Pounding down the rough-hewn edges
Lifting into dancing vapors,
Raining onto meadows,
Washing out the earth-
Which is where I spent the night.