poetry

The Proxy Eros
by Mookie Katigbak

You might as well know nothing is free of you:
When I herd these tribes and fashion cities
With my words, you are what's missing. If it's true
That we move from one exhaustion to
Another, you are the tenor and the vehicle
Of what I cannot name in the things I do:
Gray mist of cities, scent of ambrosia
And bergamot, each stone I overturn: these are not
you./

What you are is the questing where and far
Pleasure of the girl lighting the lamp,
Darting into the gaps of what I know
Even as I call you out in this skein of words.

You swale from the low, darling,
(Show your face)      You do.

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