For S.S.
Inside the skin’s where it happens.
Amazing what that space contains—
Interstices, the roads, all mapped
By what we’ve done—our lives’ refrain,
A song within the skin. Childhood
Anxieties, first love, the rough
And tumble scars, ecstatic good—
All melt, and cool—become one tough
Amalgam: our unburnished selves.
There reside affections, taste, pain,
And politics. And there we delve
Among the crystal cracks, to gain
That sense of who we are, to find,
Among inchoate parts, a center.
Sometimes, inside the skin, the mind
Demurs, sweeps out all debris—vents,
And leaves that arid space within
Where plain grief abides, untarnished
By our lives’ complex and foolish
Stuff—just empty, inside the skin.
(7/9/07)