THIS TIME

"When you get up in the morning, smooth out the shape of your body from the bed."

Thank you Pythagoras for your hypotenuse of the dream
the triangulation of mind body spirit in a field of 300 count Egyptian cotton.

Even the sunrise holds the shadows in high esteem
saying words such as new and day and break.

Like the hollow forms in the ash of Vesuvius
the puzzles we leave behind are empty.

Meanwhile on the edge of the street we stand
marveling at the migration of geese
while scholars sift through the dust.

Last night I dreamed of snow
vast stretches of cold white perfection
mysteriously balanced sculpted into
frozen dances or lovers' entanglements
but getting close I touch hard plastic forms beneath
and beneath that trickery
the smell of the past rankled enough to wake me up

and send me shuffling through the dark
reaching for door frames fingertips on walls
positioning myself over that hard white opening
porcelain pure functional and implacably sterile
that frightened me so much as a child.

I guess I'm older.
Something's changed I know.

Give me the song of one Winter visitor on a telephone wire
and I'll be good.

Even one of those slow whorled shells emerging emerging
their antennae thrusting in the rains
will do.

All I ask. All I ask is new. This time.