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Sunday, September 02, 2012

Things Which Enclose Me

—Photo by D.R. Wagner, Elk Grove



somewhere i have never travelled
—e.e. cummings

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously) her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens; only something in my understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain, has such small hands

__________________

—Medusa

To hear e.e. cummings read his poem and to see the original manuscript and its punctuation, go to www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWcuGo0rEFo