The Nacreous Interior
       

Here we are in the mishearing, in the fugue,
an amplifier upon which to rest the book,

scratching in the forsythia or at least
a game of definitions as the sky rotates

around the house. Such a refined stance,
this thought, what it takes up

in the mouth, a length of shadow
as if across the strand. By way of example,

a line of divers, one by one, arc into the sea.
In my own dream I scurry from room to room,

reconstituting history. But
it is always sadness that locks us

in the middle of cities, and it is always anger
that shoves us toward the frontier.

The impulse is to scale the best working thought
into a rolling blanket of clouds.

Here the light comes down in distinct classes.
The water has

a slightly floral taste. When I am unlucky
like this, it can feel,

like a kind of prize. Back, back,
such is the rapping sound

a question makes. When you arrive
we are all exquisitely tired,

laying ourselves out beneath the reflection
of the room itself

in the glass doors.

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Copyright © 2017 Ryo Yamaguchi All rights reserved
from Bennington Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission