Exit

A Poem by D

I think exile is every poet's secret hope.

Today I hang up my hat,
turn in the ball-point pens
and throw my keys down gutters.
These bricks are not a home
now that reason has taken flight.
I bid goodbye to old friends,
unplug myself from the human grid,
and erase my name from memory.
When the lights of the homeland
fade like dying lamps on streets,
when I am nothing once again,
I will travel toward the woods.

Under the sloping eaves of green
my teeth will supplant my tongue,
a voice become as soft and
sharp as wind through the leaves.
My body will unclothe itself in
a languid fever sprung by spring
as the nightingale sings her sonnet.
The only authority wielded over me
shall be the hunger of a
heart seeking simply to beat in
the pursuit of a lusty life.
I will travel toward the woods.