Book

I lost my book. It’s got the names in it.

Names for things and goods; structures,

Types, boundaries, procedures, goads.

My girl is in it, she who carried it

Within her like a rare worm

Until the untended bird came

And tore its leaves from her

As she lay there,

Pencil pressing page,

Taking it all down.

Then the vast storehouses came down too,

And the small secret ones,

The shelves and grappling hooks,

Dust, ink, lead, linen, ragged board.

It’s time to go home and wash up.

Home was in the book in my possession

When I was reading what had been put down

In her hand and mine,

Instructions, inventories,

Names.

But I can’t read this while looking at words

While I am assigned to living

In what is called a home.

It is all unkept.

Its yard has turned back to heat-giving

Snail-like deposits drowning in daylight

By the mossed-over fence post.

We lived here once?

We took words down for all the names,

Made markings?

That book is lost, reader,

Not misplaced.

Copyright Credit: Mark Levine, "Book" from Travels of Marco. Copyright © 2016 by Mark Levine. Reprinted by permission of Four Way Books, www.fourwaybooks.com.

Source: Travels of Marco (Four Way Books, 2016)