The Work of the Left Hand

When the combat has stopped
and the soldiers lie still in their blood,
after the city is sacked
the women raped
and you find the gold
is only gold, and the salt
of every attempt to escape the empty hour
only sharpens your pain

if you make a cup
of your grief, it becomes
an invitation --
Construct it
as a bird makes its nest --
a shelter, a cradle

And in that room
of your emptiness, wait,
until the waiting is a place
you have lived, a place you know
by heart

When you lie awake
amid the ruins of your sleeping city
waiting for dreams
that have abandoned you
and you wait
through the night,
hold the emptiness
like a porch light left on
or a door left open
to welcome the vast mysterious dark

In the holding, the cupping, the waiting,
you will shape your longing,
you will grow stronger
and stronger,
till when the Great Love comes,
magnificent black wings shining,
you have made a place
so immense
from the shadows of your doubt
that place is all there is of you

Then you become
The Visitation
You swallow that black star
and for a while
you are light itself

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