Tuesday, 14th June 2016
There are some things we just shouldn’t have words for. Language is inadequate. Touch, love, and empathy is better.
But where there can be words, Mark Doty is better.
2. EVERYWHERE
I thought I’d lost you. But you said I’m imbued
in the fabric of things, the way
that wax lost from batik shapes
the pattern where the dye won’t take.
I make the space around you,
and so allow you shape. And always
you’ll feel the traces of that wax
soaked far into the weave:
the air around your gestures,
the silence after you speak.
That’s me, that slight wind between
your hand and what you’re reaching for;
chair and paper, book or cup:
that close, where I am: between
where breath ends, air starts.
by Mark Doty, from Where You Are