The horizon of all possibilities
returns as the muffled terror of institutions—
gleaming waxed floors
long corridors & locked rooms
stretch into interminable futures

wherein whiteness is the administration of days
which
will not suffer a whit of deviation
or allow more than a rectangle of sky—

The wind blows in squalls
and between clouds & clouds
words shrivel the will

but if one were to say that words could be prayers
if one were to say that words could be love or tokens of love
if one were to say that words could grieve

then the wind that blows in squalls might be the sound of elegies
through the pines
& the fog at dusk could be said to be settling back
on the green forests & the black mountains,
hushed & hushing
a syllabic quietness
demanding nothing
vanishing at dawn