Poem and Stone

The fragment of a dead volcano in my pocket

I walk to the end of endless frost.

Yesterday, a hand in my hand

but today only the struggle

of a tongue at the end of my fingertips

talking to stone.

In the distance, smoke rises and settles.

Ember under ash

a volcano speaking in the mouth

a molten current of words

a brilliant hell—

that is poetry

scratching, immortalizing 

the winter of exile.