The Rest of the World

Today,

walking this solemn
stone street.
Just remnants
of color remain.

What is locked within
each person passing?

A room.  A shade.  A shadow.

A memory where
the lightest touch,
a stranger’s glance

changes,

changes me.  Now
a year of mornings
one after the other

disappears

into the whiteness.
Lost in all its brilliance.

And I am here knowing

even through the vastness,
an ocean cannot drink

itself.  A rose

cannot cut itself
away or reach
the vase alone.