–“To see, we must forget the name of the thing we are looking at.” – Claude Monet

Drawn up from glazed sleep, my consciousness returns to me,
a thousand drowsy houseflies gathering to settle on the windowsill.

I break the wax on this day, snap on the lamp and dose
with reheated coffee. I enter into this cathedral one line at a time.

The stain glass is dark and I incandesce in the dance of yellow flames
on white candles in red glass votives. I steal time from my voracious day,

and wonder where I am. The world doesn’t need my ars poetica,
it doesn’t need me to redefine the saltpeter heart.

This morning is cold like all mornings away from night’s kiln. I reach
to the barrier to see in the not-me a soft-edged reflection.

If I invite you here, lay your hand on this frescoed wall, do it not
to learn of purpose or valor, but rather that you see your story

written in the plaster cracks of saints’ robes. You can only see it as you will,
even with my breath in your ear. We exist between dogma, between stanzas.