Because against this, that
Because the angels of our better nature
And the angle of days to come
Because as we said goodbye As we say goodbye
Because this is the book of bursting through
And the book of coming undone
Because bricks without straw
Because bruise without respite
And the compulsion to be heard
Because the crack in everything
And because the darkening
Because the darkness
And the daughter of Pharaoh in every generation
Because the distance between
And the dog,
chained in some fool’s backyard: barking and barking—
Because the dream of crossing
Because the ego that dreamt (its elliptical nature)
And the events of the night—
Because the faceless god of frogs & thunder
And the faithful god of time
Because the fear And the fire And the fissure
Because glimpses of—
And Heisenberg’s uncertainty
Because I cannot live on tomorrow’s bread
Because I-will-be sent me to you
Because if this, then that And imagine all the people
And in the interstices, hidden
Because joining one thing to another
Because knee deep in muddy water
Because the light of a candle
in the heart of the sun
Because locusts & lice And the long strange trip
Because love supreme And the luminous underneath
Because mantles marked Because metaphoric
Meteoric And the middle that will not hold
Because naked ambition And nothing as it was
And the one who takes off her shoes
And the one and the one and the one—
Because of this permeable world
And the photo that spreads beyond the frame
Because the point of no return And the portable palace
Because the protests in Tahrir Square
(All that purposeful unbecoming)
Because the quotidian
Because the radical
Because the sea filled with baskets
And seeing an angel in the marble, he carved
Because starry, starry night And a steel bar can be bent
Because suitcases filled with suffering
Because the touchable—
Because the unleavened— And the vertical drop.
Because what is in your hand
And what I am is what I am And when you drew the map
And where we’re going, there’s no—
Because who will live in our house
And who will memorize our story
And why we’re whispering Why we’re whispering
as we say goodbye
Because xenophobia
Because you and you and you
Because zealotry and zeitgeist
And the Zen koan: one drop reveals the ocean
Because zero & zilch & zip
Because the zany zookeeper
unlocked the cage—
