What The Body Knows

The body dances in a darkened room Turning itself inside out So that skin can face the light in fractures, Slip like shadow through skeleton walls, Begin to cry — really — to scream About the tarnished weight of dreams. This has been a drift after all. The body returns to its original place, Moves from one to the other — creeps — Tries to flee itself, lone trunk, Searches for remain of bark, Hints of what it used to be. Perhaps an ocean framed in bone, A pair of birds in early white, Flying from this dream to the next Fixing the gaps between memory And reverberation; binding spine On vein, feather to lesion. The body collects its wandering parts, Leans back through layers Of thickening water; roots above Boughs beneath, feet caving in to wonder. It’s how the world reverses itself, How the distant sky finds the earth.