Emptiness

 

 

 

I wanted to know

how to make things beautiful

on the window ledge for instance

where light lies like a taught film

over the freshly oiled sill

and things have shadows

like tall men.

 

Maybe if I moved them around.

 

When my large Spanish dictionary

thumps from upright onto the floor

it startles the breath out of me.

I spread my shoulders, expand,

suck in the beautiful air.

 

Beyond the window

beauty bathes undressed

on the far mountain

with a forehead of snow

and a cap of sunlight

even in the empty places

whose detail I cannot see.

 

How to fill carefully

sculpted bowels and vials

with equal emptiness.

 

First things first.

 

Straighten the candle

to burn upright;

the rooster, green pepper

and two onions

have to hang in the kitchen

or dining room;

the lizard needs to stick

on the proper wall

to bathe its beautiful back

in the right light.

 

 

I know where beauty is not –

 

in the jumble of stuffed

 lines,

 mess

of much

 too much

to say to do to think to see.

 

And sometimes

 

    where it is.

 

My hand in your hand

 

for instance

 

   a beautiful thing

 

with just enough

 

  emptiness.

 

 

 

- Henry Rappaport