Recumbents
(To make of recumbents a resurrection. Unto what?)
Better to cure each day the incurable
(That pontiff spoke of a spirit of resurrection)
like a doctor in Jaffa, force death
to refine his checkmate, this day the same
one we recognize, like a child dons a costume
once past awakening’s surprise, neath his mask of one risen
I believe something like an air of resurrection
is at work with death and it’s up to the poem
whose telling carries off more than it enrolls
taking things by the heteronyms
of the other thing it desires
to say of poetry that whatever you bind
in its name shall be bound on earth
