Classic Poem

She shuts out the city now
by closing the door and lowering the drapes—
she puts on the light by daytime

Those are her things,
the animals of her solitude
reaching up to her from the corners,
and in the wall
a built-in gas stove,
a sink,
and shelves for groceries.
A small exile
with a bed in its recesses,
and a table,
with stories to induce sleep,
and ashtray
and small candles

Everything has its predestined place,
a presence that nourishes itself
on bread and water
from the steps of time,
a mantle and a slumbering
in its shifting shadow

Everything has its lust, its weeping,
the flavor of the body
grown used to solitude,
meditating on itself.
Everything is a mirror
possessing her face,
the same intimacy and brokenness
of her limbs

Perhaps she came in childhood
upon such a place as this,
and a light,
a vase which casts
a shadow on a spotless sheet

Perhaps by way of necklaces
and candelabra, she summons up
a spirit who will take her back
to gardens long since left,
springs where faces spread across
clear water,
smiling in the depth.

It wasn't me
she was talking to,
but somebody else
whose borrowed face
she stared in.