Four Poems

liquidas orasse sorores

Of bodies reassigned, I sing
long before Ovid and his pack of lies

when the Bosphorus was welded shut
one last time, and you could walk
from Greece to Turkey against the traffic.
Now there is nowhere to cross
so we sail away, into the soapy water
of your absence. And I surprise myself
with this shipping manifest.

I thump out a tune and drive myself mad
very close to your location. Unless you are
the census-taker of dreams
or the functionary who
sees death in his board game.

Do we not bleed, are we not prone to bruising.
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