from the scent of lilac
and the sound of running water
a whole spring is extracted
in the landscape of a poem
the lilac bush is planted right there
in the first line.

a rose bush
is reflected in the window
a bubble is waiting to be scooped up
from the sparkling brook

and from the secret rooms
of a poem,
limbs outstretched on the bed
are mountains and rivers too
with underground rapids
surging toward the middle of the verse
where a peach-flushed ballad
breaks out of the walls of the room

a hand is raised high.
a voice whispers,
i want to be loved
because there is no substitute
for an encounter
of flesh and blood
(he reads the newspapers
eats breakfast
and imagines her brushing her hair)

memories and dreams
are a puddle
that cannot be wiped off
the bed-covers,
the poem is dumbfounded
by the red tongue of desire
that licks the sheets

rivers and streams
burn between thighs
in the seventh verse
and dreams only drift
in your direction
like willow catkins caught by the wind

the name that you whisper
sinks into echoes in the eighth verse.
all night you pace the room
as my fingers nip the candlewick
and you cannot understand why the brook
sobs instead of chuckles
when it flows through the palm of your hand

you are awakened by cold jade
nine thousand candles burn
in nine mirrors in the ninth verse.
a bright moon shines on the sleepless,
a woman walks toward you along the wall
her face an illusion in the mist

she hands you a lock of dark hair
that turns to a wisp of smoke
it is water and will rise
to become a cloud
it is soil and will be trampled
into a path on which you walk
it is a face hiding among the leaves
more despairing than a sunset

her hands
point to the window
where the sun is rising in the fragrant air
a pair of wings fly into the fading moonlight
whispers recede farther and farther away
an echo reverberates in the next to last line--

the window opens and it's dawn