My poems and my lips taste the same
As my flesh, as my name.
A shape—before touching—which you see
Is how my lips first spoke for me.
My lips still have nothing to say
To your beauty on this beautiful day.
Your beautiful name in the night
Swings back and forth in my brain like a light
In the breeze of an approaching storm:
Cold at first, and then very warm.
My poems speak for my lips:
On the ocean of my sighs, the ships.
Do you see my poems, lighted things,
In the mist, longing for shore where the longing shore bird sings?
I told my lips the other day,
My poems, in scintillating array,
Will be a navy for my lips, which cannot say
What it feels like in our hearts when ships take our hearts away.
My poems and my lips are almost the same—
Each made of dust, one crying your name
In a glorious attempt at fame:
Yours—if lips are not shaped the same.
