I’m only wanting
ownership to lay long
like that, long and low enough
for continental time to clot.

I’m only wanting
a bead of amber
less fiber than milk.
I’m only wanting
the terminal magic
of a sunrise unmanned
by ice.

I’m only wanting
not repetition
but its nearest drove:
the skewing, irised hulls
of a lurid incalculability.

I’m only wanting
to believe the black
behind cupped hands
could dragoon an ark.
That verge’s faces
and talus could unloose
kinder weather.

I’m only wanting
to touch the feel
of touching:
that radial space
either bloody or wooden.
I’m only wanting
to apprehend the implacable
rhythm of depletion
clacking in a germ’s sting.

I’m only wanting
to say
and say it flat.
I’m only wanting
an oar’s vigor,
a tongue equal
to the inching blast
of its sulfuric
contexture. To
drape each thud.
To spit a little against
being’s unbroken
drought. To wash
breath’s seasickness.

I’m only wanting
the sayer, the saying,
the ear to flash out.
How it was that
it was all to have said,
“All bones
pattern a uniform.
All bones
are a fish’s bones.
All bones grow
to master the backstroke.”