Darkness of the Subjunctive

If we were in infinity, we would be everywhere,

even inside ourselves, as taste resides in the walnut,

and the walnut resides in the shell.

Then we would thrive inside the subjunctive,

where nothing happens but dreams of being,

as paradise dreams of its inferno,

the inferno of cotton candy.

If only the world had ripened, like a pear,

it might have melted the mirror in me,

delivering its softness to the hard road of the mind,

sixty miles from town.

              And if our grammar were even to our heat,

comma, conditional phrase, comma,

we’d be addicted to the sentence,

sentenced to an exile that sees, hears, and thinks,

and is often mistaken for love.

              Trees are chronologies;

every leaf shines, and in turning over it winks an eye:

if, if, and then. The world is possible meaning;

the world is possible, meaning:

I might have been an elf, had I been elfin.

But I am not an elf. I am a giant with tiny hands:

would, could, and should.

Had I been winged, I might have flown

from industrial field to pastoral alley

on great woolen wings, with the blue face of a bee.

Then it would have been said, “He is repairing to his persona,”

or “He is retiring to his future.”

I’ll copy this by way of the stars, reflective.

Get back to me by facsimile or dream of climbing a night ladder

to the place of ideal size, near a town of simple affection.

If we had been born, lived our lives, and died,

we might have existed. On the side of darkness, infinity;

on the other, a sixty watt bulb.