No One Bears Witness For The Witness

A Poem, Being An Instance Of Language, Hence Essentially Dialogue, May Be A Letter In A Bottle Thrown Out To The Sea With The-surely Not Always Strong-hope That It May Somehow Wash Up Somewhere, Perhaps On The Shoreline Of The Heart. In This Way, Too, Poems Are En Route: They Are Headed Towards. Toward What? Toward Something Open, Inhabitable, An Approachable You, Perhaps, An Approachable Reality. Such Realities Are, I Think, At Stake In A Poem.

How You Die Out In Me: Down To The Last Worn-out Knot Of Breath You're There, With A Splinter Of Life.

They've Healed Me To Pieces.

Reachable, Near And Not Lost, There Remained In The Midst Of The Losses This One Thing: Language. It, The Language, Remained, Not Lost, Yes, In Spite Of Everything. But It Had To Pass Through Its Own Answerlessness, Pass Through Frightful Muting, Pass Through The Thousand Darknesses Of Deathbringing Speech. It Passed Through And Gave Back No Words For That Which Happened; Yet It Passed Through This Happening. Passed Through And Could Come To Light Again, “enriched” By All This.

A Poem, As A Manifestation Of Language And Thus Essentially Dialogue, Can Be A Message In A Bottle, Sent Out In The –not Always Greatly Hopeful-belief That Somewhere And Sometime It Could Wash Up On Land, On Heartland Perhaps. Poems In This Sense Too Are Under Way: They Are Making Toward Something. Toward What? Toward Something Standing Open, Occupiable, Perhaps Toward An Addressable Thou, Toward An Addressable Reality.