13thWR

THE VOYAGER

The voyager sits in his living room,
Becomes the wind going through the walls
As angels do in Tintoretto. Now a traveler
He reaches towards his portfolio to find a map,
But his portfolio sits by his bed back in his bedroom.
He sees a map, a map crawling on its knees
Toward a rumor of a cathedral, but the map
Crawls away from him, becomes more distant.
Before he became the wind, he believed
He was visible, had hands that could circle
Pears or hold the stem of a wine glass.
Now, since he became a traveler, he cannot
Find his hands. When he looks into a mirror,
He sees no image, only mist forms on silver glass.
But this new anonymity is one of the joys
Of turning into the wind and becoming a voyager.

WET HAIR

I trusted, was tricked,
Noah put me in a cabin without a porthole
And with a leaking roof.
Years later,
My then wet hair
Stimulated my eyes
To see the atrocities in conclaves at universities,
To see the jejune being kissed
By the murderers of June bugs
And those still weaving red dresses

- Duane Locke