I couldn’t wrap my mouth around the vowel of your name.
Your name, a cave of blue wind that burrows and delves
endlessly, that rings off the walls of my drumming, lilting heart,
through the tiny pulsations of my wrists, the blood in my neck.
I couldn’t hold the energy of your name in my mouth;
that was like trying to utter the crackle of lightning,
as if my teeth would break from its pronunciation.
I am dwarfed in the face of your magnitude,
O you whom I can’t articulate. O you of fluency
and eloquence whom I can’t fully express, my words
are only the echo of you that rings within my soul, my soul
a cave of blue wind that houses the draft of you,
the eternal vowel of you I can’t wrap my mouth around.
Lord, Lord, as close as I may gather, as close as I may say.

 

 

This poem was selected for Best of the Small Presses 2009.