Direction
by John Grey
I can have nothing in the sky
so I pick conch shells from the sea-shore,
rocks from the field,
yellow tulips out of the garden.
Though my hands reach for
sun, stars, moon,
a great distance begins at the tip of my fingers.
The earth, though, is never closer.
I can grasp what I want
but the ease of it
destroys my wanting.
Give me a sun to press against my ear
and hear its fire,
a star to skim glowing across a lake,
a moon to shimmer at the end
of ad outrageous stem.
And you wonder at my hesitance
to take you in my arms.
For the love is where I must decide...
are you earthen, are you of the heavens?
Vision, touch, have been this road before.
But are they gravity
or are they flight?
© 2009 John Grey
John Grey has been published recently in the Georgetown Review, Connecticut Review, South Carolina Review and The Pedestal, with work upcoming in Poetry East and The Pinch.
Find more by John Grey in the Author Index.
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