Pentimento

shadows
drift against the light
erasing
themselves :

the sunset
breaks
and rolls back
on my skin
no strings
attached
holding me somewhere
tokyo, berlin, oklahoma
downtown—
somewhere always
far away
where the nights are filled
with one-sided prayers
and fingers sinking into skin
like clay
de-formed
re-formed
where touch becomes sensual
and painful
where restless bodies
never fully in my grasp,
never fully settled on my eyelids,
become innate statues
searching for love
in empty spaces.

in the blink of an eye
everything is
nothing;

i am left with
a suitcase of
inadequate words,
my mother tongue
turned foreign

but when the nights cave in
and light of day pours out like honey
and bathes me in its sweetness,
i turn these words into sermons
that all the towns and cities preach.