KINGDOM AND DREAM: THE TERRIBLE ONE

My father, so they said, 
went up to heaven. 
Heaven is so pure 
and transparent 
that a dark hidden line 
forever divides 
those who dwell in the sky 
from those who dwell in the body. 
And the terrible, 
it need not be repeated, 
is eternal. 

At the end of the thirty-day mourning period 
or on the day when a year has passed 
matter meets matter 
the tombstone which covers the skeleton 
is unveiled 
out of a belief in the eternity of the stone. 
Let them be satisfied with the lie. 

And in those days 
the world of non-speech 
was eternal. 
Later we studied Bialik: 
     “I did not have my father for many years, his days with me were brief, 
       while I was only a tender child, before I had had my fill of his presence, 
       while I was still in need of his compassion, the protection of his hands, 
       death took him from me, separated us forever, but I hid his image in 
       my heart, I could call it up before me.” 
Knowing so much, lacking so much 
I did not say a word. 
Today I say: 
Poetry is speech 
in a place 
where there will never be touch. 

KINGDOM AND DREAM: THE TERRIBLE ONE