THE LONG NIGHT OF THE BODY
By Ruth Daigon

She dreads the thought of going back
empty handed,
with memory shredded
into alphabets of silence.

Through the long night of the body,
she weaves a tapestry,
finger tips remembering each stitch,
each stroke a small pulling together

of her entrance into the world, poised
like a bird, shaped
into a moment of wings
in a perfect attention of flight,

of branching roads beneath her,
corridors of wind, tattoos of light,
a sliver of stream finding its path

through rock and earth and clay,
through a universe of seeds
moting the calm summer air
and wonder leaping in recognition.

In a hush of color, she returns
unencumbered.
Twisting like a blade
edgewise to the moon's light she
slips through it for one hour,
the next,
then all the others.