ART ON ART
"What is love?" she asked
and I had no answer:
The bric-a-brac of all my poems
perhaps; the desultory search
for some perfection
of place and emotion.
How do I describe feeling good?
How would I describe love?
Does the feeling change
because I examine it?
Would I feel any better
if I knew why?
The melancholy of a reality without love
settles on my soul
shutting out the light of life.
A late day for regret,
as I watch a biography of Eugene O'Neill
and wonder if his lines have crossed into mine.
The reach of art on art
would seal the edges of the cape
so tight no light can penetrate or escape.
In the blackness of space
my ever changing face
cracks a wrinkled smile.
My razor irritated face
stings and invites a scratch.
I was blind and deaf in the street
stunned by something larger than me
and from my silence her question.
"What is love?" she asked.
But I had nothing to say.