Process of Elimination
Process of Elimination
The years disclose that I am not a face,
a shape, a posture, or a crop of hair,
for I have lost all these, and yet I’m here.
I am whatever stands in those things’ place.
Subtract my gentleness, a coward’s grace.
Remove this rage and courtesy’s veneer.
Slide back the paper screens of self that snare
with furtive silhouettes the inward gaze.
Now I am the wind without the trees,
progress unseen, and now the leaves at rest.
I’m branches broken for the fire, undressed
to ashes. I who thought myself a hive
for honey gathering am sealed alive,
a husk leaking drip by drip its bees.
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