I sat and wept at a brightness that was you: an autumn sun forlornly pouring
light on the corpses of the flowers — a thousand blossoms dead, with no roots.

Grave to decay, and no dreams.

I saw the artist paint his portrait, and wished to know how your eyes
grew clear and darkened at sight of his canvas, and how, at each stroke,
they searched for the clear water of your eye: were you thinking of me?

Or what?

Your poverty brought many, many gifts, which the artist and I,
having explored together that barren wasteland, as tourists through one dead spring,
took to Bali, for a holiday, that morning.

The darkness of the vacant land was covered with blossoms and yellow fruits.
The blackbirds that flew from tree to tree folded like aprons.
The birds all looked, above, like spiders’ threads.

I tried to imagine the inside of that bee, searching for the flower
with a tail, that flew away from him, yet who with it had already disappeared:
from which dark was a fire (Light in front, fire in back)

Or was it an illusion that would be blown away by the wind?
The honey-like fruit of the wild apple, turning dark
as the bee drank, or was devoured.

We all died that day, one after the other, and how they died, I can never know:
like the drop of water that is misted up and creates a sea of salt in the skies.

I saw it, and wept, for you were killed, and I thought of how much
you’d longed to go to the honey.
But how it must have been for you to die:

As the bee, all writhing,
Eaten away.

The bee, is what I remember most.
The bees were only like us.

They were trying to do the same thing as we did:
to make it all better.

Like me.

So I put you into a box, and wrote on the lid:

I shall go now, it is time.

:: 08.10.2022 ::