The Question

Were I to give up means, live twixt the nights
And boulevards, by night jump fire to fire
That light but themselves, let thought’s tarpaulin
Descend black on color, where the question?

We who of late absorb what our way comes
One by one appear, cannot break the scheme
Each carries a holy orb to no end;
I’ll drop mine, go down unto where I stand.

Thus of old the argument, portrait hung
On speech’s present thread each time heard, but ne’er
Remembered, for it comes at journey’s end.
Death knows all its peers; the live know nothing.

And now that you float in your element
No man shall see in eye the set of sun
Means what it says. For that that will be e’er
Speeding time narrows to a dot spares none.

Hence all of us, who walk upon this earth
Art frail, just steps in a great crystal dance,
And incident but throws shadows on its face.
Certain rhythms dear to falconers and kings…

But since all still breathe, leave such borrowed robes
To the none who join the many. Speak again.
And say that the sun at uncertain speed
Did offer you the choice twixt all and none.

That none leads to all, the bleak vice-versa
And all else mind’s dual chamber congers
Racing down mirror halls where all’s made like
Won’t help a jot now that you’re here and speak.

Nor clever proofs that such choice has been made
Abet the stinging need to blindly go.
On the dark bank, deeper than desire
Mirages that lingered aside a whole life

Ask you to join them in an ambiguous timber.
And what on this bank? The steady halogen
Pervades, obscures flickering candles.
This is the offered land, prostrate before you.

Hear, you are one, who must choose.
The river you ford has no qualities
And you’ll never know on which bank stands
She who walked sevenfold around the flame.

Thus the question.