the city once accepted your invitation / and for awhile once...

light down the hallways, silt on your lips

she is coming quietly softly now / all through the high valleys ringing / and still you are—

staring at the little animals staring at / circling just beyond what is visible, what is circling, what is visible just beyond

there her fingers trace another doorway / there the hills vibrate

he might seek to pull her back to him / and still you are how very still / held by a whispering all through and into:

you find no before in her story / you find the old ways her fingers go gracefully again

let he who seeks / as time is shifting on the walls

as she makes a different choice / as the future makes an insurmountable push

but no that’s all forgotten now and done / you cannot be gentle you cannot rest