A Sweet Truth

A sweet truth brushes my soul, caresses my breast.

While I reach toward my heart, it dances over my hand,
trembling through my fingers, slipping past, but not dropped;
apprehended, but not grasped.

My elbow bends, extending my arm in a sweep of space,
but the truth eludes the circle drawn;
it instead imposes its own presence:
my wrists yield to its press. It buoys my arms,
giving lift to my shoulders and lightness to my head.

My torso stretches up against its force, this truth.
Its weight teeters upon my wrists and I balance the arch of my back
with a forward shift of my loins, forward
until my knees fold and my
head snaps front to keep from falling;
balanced but dropped
to my knees with a jolt,
head bowed.

The truth that shored my shoulders closes in like a shadow
of immense light: I collapse in a ball,
encompassed,
overwhelmed. Truth enters my sides,
my belly, my vessels, my glands,
my lungs until I respire its essence,
sweat its virtue,
bleed its words.


Dedicated to John Nimmiti