We never quite could tell
strength from stupidity
pride in perseverance
the point where stubbornness
purchased a harvest
of futility
If the body has forgotten
how to sleep
what chance has thought
to teach its subtleties
like tenderness or faith
All that could matter
is the reciprocating
want of flesh
wordless and beyond translation
to idea or category
nothing numerical
and yet not boundless either
nothing so grand or abstract
In other words we were not brutes
for lack of feeling
nor sorrowful in spiteful isolation
not lonely yet
but damaged by avoiding touch
being only smart enough to trust
that there’s some gifted outcast family somewhere
as jolly as entertainers
that still performs the music we need
to reconnect our feet to dirt
to fling our arms like windmills spinning
in dusted twilights
The point being
not that you beat yourself up
appreciating what so and so has done for you
but that you finally remember
you’ve been her gypsy too
To those of you in desperate need
of love and money
there is no matter who or where you are
never enough
Of careful prayers and measured want
the world has taught each generation
how to lose
Of what I’ve learned from hands
that don’t know what they’re doing
people who ignorantly think
pain is ‘a part of life’
get plenty of it
What ice can’t soothe
eventually needs fire
and finally
earth
© Lorenzo Thomas, from Dancing In The Street (Coffee House Press, 2004)