SUBJECT>Rue POSTER>Laurel EMAIL> DATE>1107804773 IP_ADDRESS>156.77.108.71 PASSWORD>aaFRbor6/KzWk PREVIOUS> NEXT> 83154 83179 IMAGE> LINKNAME> LINKURL>

Rue

i measure sparsity between lines
--Rosanna Licari

Call me pearl diver. (Your) silence plunges
me under. Call me giant oyster. (Your) silence pries

me open. I’m not boasting: I can hold my breath
(or your hand) forever. Enraptured by lack

of warmth, of sound, of actual world otherwise
so reliable and solid. Fixated upon how it becomes

suddenly as distant as a dream half-remembered
and dissipating as each minute progresses

toward wakefulness. Call me one-ton stone. (Your) silence
sinks me to the bottom. The surface, dappled

as a horse, gallops over. Too high for me to reach.
Last night, I listened with interest to my heart’s irregular

rhythm for the first time in at least a century.
The night sky flailed, a comet flaunted its tail: Look at me!

But I was too wearied to care, too tired to see.
Your letter, scant words scattered on the page like seed

in a fallow field, remained sealed. Not a single witness
to this scene: Woman alone in bed, an emptied shell, pitiable,
(pitying).