Image Tensed

Image tensed,

I eye the instant,

Anticipation welling—

And I expect no one;

In the lit shadows

I watch as the doorbell

Sheds its inaudible

Pollen of sound—

And I expect no one;

Within four walls

Astounded more by space

Than any desert place,

I expect no one;

But come he will,

He must, if I hold on

To bloom unseen;

He’ll suddenly appear

When I am least aware:

Coming as if to forgive

All he gives to death,

Coming to assure me

Of his reward and mine,

Coming as anodyne

For my pain, for his—

Perhaps his whisper is

Already on its way.