for D.T. and other lonely people
Yesterday I said the thing
I was trying to say
perfectly to myself. I am something
astounding, I am like the Grand
Canyon, I said, by which I meant
I sometimes feel hedged in
by those who would sweat in hot cars for days
just to stand and look at me. And people think
I am saying I am a spectacle, a wonder
surrounded by nothing
as huge as me, and people think I am
claiming majesty. People travel for days
to look at the most important canyon, which is to say
the biggest empty space. Sometimes
I might as well kick pea gravel over the side
rather than try to explain who I am
and wait until I hear it hit the ground.
What I am trying to say
in small, hard words that always fall away
from what I mean,
is I am not the canyon, the immense
perfection of its depth, I am more
the missing earth dispersed,
trying to feel whole, to believe
that God makes sometimes
by taking away.