Can not go by Laura Pelick. Image Courtesy the Artist
That Shams Tabrizi refused
figs and dates should be our first
concern, as the rain grows
heavy on the highway
between Pleasure City
and the Gate of Arrows.
And so it was the hunger held him,
cradled him, a candle of a man
twisting, telling tales, being
involved, as rooms are
in our lives, and lovers, too.
I put my thumb inside
where nobody’s lived nor died
for centuries. But still the call,
and a boy in white with flowers.
This is what books are for:
making entrances from ends,
so that the columns and fires
we’ve forgotten, and the figs
denied and offered, declare:
the blood of one is your blood,
too, the prophets and singers
and damned who came before
come back with stories,
bruised fingers, oaken bowls
for us to fill. The rain at Rose Wall
reminded me of morning
this afternoon, and then a man
brought the rain inside us.
He smelled like the spices
your grandmother smelled
in her youth, in a shawl
stitched with gold thread.
~Carl Boon
Carl Boon lives in Istanbul, where he directs the English prep school and teaches courses in literature at Yeni Yuzyil University. Recent or forthcoming poems appear in Posit, The Adirondack Review, The Tulane Review, Badlands, and other magazines.
