I could say betrayal    I could say there is love

and it doesn’t touch this sadness    I could say

you are rain falling   you are mist rising

and icicles forming    I am a stream   a river

moving along the bed of the earth and we are

elementally the same but formally opposites

I could say language is a gauze on the

crusted heart   I could say language is all

we have    is the house we build and tear down

build and tear down   I could say …

I could say before we used words our eyes

spoke    I will say when we got off the phone

and I walked outside   the cottontail’s ears

quivered as the light at dusk shone through them.
 
 
 
*Original music accompanying these poems were written by Steve Jones who is a composer, musician, songwriter, and teacher who lives in Kensington, MD. He has written two jazz musicals.