Counting

[I ran through the streets] counting the breaths between each house and lighted window. counting the breaths between each glimpse of street.
- K.W.


But I say we've been counting since birth --
the heart beats and lungs breathe,
leg bone goes before the other,
and eyelids flutter.

I can even row the air
with my elephant ears.
A poly-rhythmic orchestra,
a jangling mantra, repeating,

the body counts the path
of its wandering, the hope
of its lungs, the scenes
of its centripetal vision.

It's midnight. Constellations rise
and fall, conducting a sea
of sleeping bodies heaving
and resting, like wavelets

that cover the oceans.
We touch, dance and rise
against one another, together.
We are each lit by our own moon.

[ca. June 05]