The contortions of belief
that protect our desires,

the contortions of desire,
that protect our beliefs,

are rectified in

the clarity of philosophy,
the intensity of poetry.

There are small shifts within the body,
the first emotions, to which our lives
adjust, in obedience and resistance.

They have been there from the start.
They do not master us, but are a limit
on our sovereignty, our reach.

The first concepts are beyond us.
From things within its grasp, the body
learns. In understanding and confusion,

our knowledge grows, without end,
without purpose or finality.
We are curious, friend. Curious indeed.

Perhaps we are suspended over it
and the depth, not ours to choose.

Perhaps, poised or clamoring,
we are free only to leap or slip.

Or, perhaps, perhaps, the depth
itself is ours to set, but the fall,

out of our hands. Thus we forget
how it is we lay us down to sleep.

A body is always able to be itself.

(Every body promises to be itself.)

It is always possible to be yourself.

It's not easy. It is the difficulty.

No depth is reached
by poetry.
No, you are released
by poetry

           into it.