Bridget Huh | Photo: Isabela Marino
I.
For what we call the present.
For the sake of future loss.
For what we hope will endure.
For the essential nature of a work.
For its body bound in time.
For the rhythm of a language.
For the glorification of singing.
II.
The trees want
me to recite.
What do you save
from the disaster? Hunting
rifle, camera, cast
-iron pan. The Buddha
wants nothing. He is
only a porcelain
statue. What do you say
in the disaster?
I want
to untangle the voices
of past from those
of present. I want
to recover
the last point in
history at which
we could have turned
around. The voices
are living and they
want
to go somewhere.
I want to let them.
I want
the violins to shimmer,
I want them to stand
for impermanence
while the soloist
hangs over them
like an omen
—you too
will one day find
yourself alone
floundering
in a flood of
fire
III.
To end without resolution.
To leave a hole for unending time.
To believe that time faces only one direction.
To live as though there is enough of it.
To carry on forever.