The Soft, Dry Light of Uncanny Beauty 

 

The soft, dry light of uncanny beauty

sends stars to wander across the daylight sky

to be the things that no one sees

that no one knows

 

says she, the chatelaine of nowhere

dressed as a Bedouin

dressed as her own death

dressed as an invisible color

alone in this life

aching with life

 

says she, who has a story to tell

about a broom, a house,

a lost child who may be only

a memory of urban decay,

of where she lived in her first house

in the first city, in the time

of love and love and love and love

 

says she, but now the soft, dry light

of uncanny beauty will shine no more;

instead, her grave will be a diorama—

one bone, one button, one ribbon,

one ring—or so she says

 

Little cats and dogs will pray for her,

little stars will bracelet themselves

upon her memory and she will adorn herself

with silver sighs and silver shoes 

and walk down lanes of music,

walk across the three-banked rivers

and open the doors to her first house

 

and cook a meal: one can of soup,

one flowerpot upon the table, one good day

that will come again—or so she says, when

one good day in the soft, dry light of

uncanny beauty will be when she wakes and sleeps,

when she is good and brave, strange and serene

​

 

Now read all this and ask yourself:

where do you think she went?

Where is she now? If I say she is

still wandering, will you say 

she is lost to the rhythm of time?

 

If so, let the stars keep her secrets

Secretly, let the little dogs laugh