#splittings

1.

My body opens over San Francisco like the day –

light raining down each pore crying the change of light

I am not with her I have been waking off and on

the presence of the past destructive

to living here and now Yet if I could instruct

myself, if we could learn to learn from pain

even as it grasps us if the mind, the mind that lives

in this body could refuse to let itself be crushed

in that grasp it would loosen Pain would have to stand

off from me and listen its dark breath still on me

but the mind could begin to speak to pain

and pain would have to answer:

We are older now

we have met before these are my hands before your eyes

my figure blotting out all that is not mine

I am the pain of division creator of divisions

it is I who blot your lover from you

and not the time-zones or the miles

It is not separation calls me forth but I

who am separation And remember

I have no existence apart from you

2.

I believe I am choosing something now

not to suffer uselessly yet still to feel

Does the infant memorize the body of the mother

and create her in absence? or simply cry

primordial loneliness? does the bed of the stream

once diverted mourning remember the wetness?

But we, we live so much in these

configurations of the past I choose

to separate her from my past we have not shared

I choose not to suffer uselessly

to detect primordial pain as it stalks toward me

flashing its bleak torch in my eyes blotting out

her particular being the details of her love

I will not be divided from her or from myself

by myths of separation

while her mind and body in Manhattan are more with me

than the smell of eucalyptus coolly burning on these hills

3.

The world tells me I am its creature

I am raked by eyes brushed by hands

I want to crawl into her for refuge lay my head

in the space between her breast and shoulder

abnegating power for love

as women have done or hiding

from power in her love like a man

I refuse these givens the splitting

between love and action I am choosing

not to suffer uselessly and not to use her

I choose to love this time for once

                                                      We are older now we have met before     these are my hands before your eyes my figure blotting out     all that is not mine I am the pain of division     creator of divisions it is I who blot your lover from you and not the time-zones nor the miles It is not separation calls me forth     but I who am separation     And remember I have no existence     apart from you

2. I believe I am choosing something new not to suffer uselessly     yet still to feel Does the infant memorize the body of the mother and create her in absence?     or simply cry primordial loneliness?     does the bed of the stream once diverted     mourning     remember wetness? But we, we live so much in these configurations of the past     I choose to separate her     from my past we have not shared I choose not to suffer uselessly to detect primordial pain as it stalks toward me flashing its bleak torch in my eyes     blotting out her particular being     the details of her love I will not be divided     from her or from myself by myths of separation while her mind and body in Manhattan are more with me than the smell of eucalyptus coolly burning     on these hills