Seven Cathedrals of Dreams

The seven cathedrals of dreams flicker
like torches.  You are always cold.
From far off you hear chants.
You pass among       faceless cowled figures.
They stand silent   writing on mirrored slates.
On each slate    you assume    another mask.

Before you can wake
you must write your name many times
in strange alphabets      you must recite
the names of all your childhood friends in the order 
of their birthdays   you must  recognize
all    the hidden faces     in the veins
of     the walls   you must

Far off
from far     off you hear chants
of the
far off you imagine the sea

Imagine the sea at full tide    like torches
as you glide through these endless corridors
while the seven cathedrals of dreams flicker.







Wordseekers

The wordseekers live
in uneasy light.
After all, experience merely
fitfully flickers,
making,
   perhaps,
       patterns
if only,
   if only. . .
What follows
(no less intense for all
its repetition)
no wordseeker knows
       beyond doubt.
The self and the other are one
until they are named--
the hub, the spokes, the rim,
the same.
Postulate a plain, a point
coordinates for those
tout en face du tentatif terrible,
           le tentateur,
the conscious cooperation
with the ephemeral,
the search for an image to embody the abstract
as the fetish
   embodies and carrries
           the life force.
To order, map, fix,
if not forever,
       for a moment at least
the inchoate world.