Three times my life has opened.
Once, into darkness and rain.
Once, into what the body carries at all times within
it and starts
to remember each time it enters the act of love.
Once, to the fire that holds all.
These three were not different.
You will recognize what I am saying or you will
not.
But outside my window all day a maple has
stepped from her leaves
like a woman in love with winter, dropping the
colored silks.
Neither are we different in what we know.
There is a door. It opens. Then it is closed. But a
slip of light
stays, like a scrap of unreadable paper left on
the floor,
or the one red leaf the snow releases in March.