Live Oak Forest
Every morning of our lives I squeezed
your hand and you squeezed back.
Because I stole you I had to check
that you were there.
When we explored the magic forest
I feared for angry tribes.
They would sever my hand.
That's what they do to thieves.
Once you lived in that desiccated
forest of the oak
moth. We brought the leaves to luster,
the butterflies to monarchy.
That night when I hydroplaned to the hospital
I was afraid to squeeze your hand.
You might squeeze back. I might steal you
and condemn us to eternal flight.
But you were still beneath the muslin sheet.
When they pulled it from your face I adored
your warm freckled shoulders
as I always did, your oaken scent.
Clouds of Cambodia
Clouds dwell like lovers over the Mekong River
We walk bare foot through the jungle, splash
through the streets.
I have no lover.
The humidity drowns me into a new life.
I bathe in water from the Mekong and shear
my long hair. The air fills with water
and the river changes course.
It is my time to be reborn, to take refuge as a crone,
to sweep the Buddhist temple with a broom
made of twigs.
In a cascade of rain we study the carving
of creation, how the two armies pull
at Naga, the snake, until the sea churns in
