“I am not separate from the likeness”

I am not separate from the likeness

of the world. I have to remind myself

that. Time unfurls its tongue just

before it dissolves. Shall I show

my hand, it says, and I take the tongue

into my mouth. There is this wild slide like

green rising from black in the morning. There is no self.

Foremost it’s like grasping thunder, trying

to hold still the curtain of time. Into

the filaments I cast my breath, not its likeness.