From Innocence Regained: Christmas Poems
So much is missing now,
so much is taken from us.
We define our lives by absences,
by cannot-haves and contradictions,
by choices impossible to choose.
And oh our opal sufferings,
the pining for our fantasies --
the lovers, absolutes, utopias --
that ever have come true.
Heavy with our vacancies,
possessed by what is not,
we are not present at our lives,
but locked within discrepancy
until some shock, some generosity,
a living moment absolute with evidence,
penetrates our absences,
turns us inside out
and presses us against
the simple presence of the world,
and we feel inside us
what is all around us,
give ourselves to what is there,
a relief so deep
we know ourselves for what we are:
totalities of moments
that have to be enough.
(1976)
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