xxxxix.

If you believe the world is your oyster
you will eat oysters every night

--if you do not believe in your knife
then you will spend all night cutting your hands.

The image of--blood and salt, on the ice,
the straw and the paper covering the table--
the fingers slipping, and the hunger
--glancing through the small windows
built for a much smaller set of souls,
or the gracious expanse of glass
--looking out onto the boulevard.

It isn't different, I don't believe
if you can hear the sea echoing
or only the rush of the traffic,
not different if you were born
for lights and alleys, or ridges
and fields.

Some weep against the world
in sweat, and the blunt calluses
are the quiet song hope
embers of rage
gone still--

When the mouth runs dry,
the brush of moving cloth
is surely somebody's song
sung for somebody--every
thing that was made, was
made for love.