Driven by a Strange Desire

I. Before Breakfast


When the sun turns gray and I become tired
of looking at your many-colored shoes


I will give you balloons for all the holes
we speak too much to fill. Who believes


in air, nowadays? Or do you prefer tea
with the dried fruit I will have to throw out


the window of your room? Because I want
this to stop I want this to stop I want this


II. Towards Moorish Spain


To kill the dragons is a different thing
in my family there are only lizards.


In Sevilla--never famous for its lamps--
a dissected crocodile hangs from a roof.


The reptile, the Crown’s Byzantine gift. Its teeth
suspended in the air of the cathedral.


I stole a pair of shoes; but didn’t run far
from the orchard where water had women’s scent.


Thirst is not fear, thirst is not green, but has wings
like dragons, or airplanes. As oranges


in Sevilla, driven by a strange desire
to stay where they are. Floating. Suspended.


III. Towards Virgo

The Milky Way is not only expanding;
the Bang is not only a Bang. It is drifting


and being pulled away from, let’s say, something.
Because dark matter is ninety nine of what


there is and visible matter is so small
it clusters together and forms a Great Wall.


China and Spain and my eyes reading the paper.
We are still together, are we not, wondering if.