Ren Powell >

A Trip to the Orient

Setting up fences to contain the mania that comes every fall. Walking the perimeter. Had a question for you yesterday, but realized as I walked around Breivatnet for the second time that I had had too much wine that night to remember your studio door. I remember the hedgehog in the taxi's headlights, waddling naked past my front gate when I got home—thinking that I hadn't even tasted what was offered, wondering if that really was a virtue. (Because I have so few, I collect them like art.) Relishing the seldom high tide of wanting. But in all the remembering, I forgot the question and went to the quay instead and watched the fish jumping. No one else seemed to notice, walking in pairs (it was Friday night) and I was glad to be alone.

Chatter

As I recall, I said something stupid,
like, "Imagination is a good thing."
even then

even as I watched the sun wolves gathering
near the edge of green sky
and the whole world was heavy
with your compliments

The rain
all that next day
silent and constant as a marriage