by Franz Wright
“If I could stop talking, completely
cease talking for a year. I might begin
to get well,” he muttered.
Off alone again performing
brain surgery on himself
in small badly lit
room with no mirror. A room
whose floor, ceiling and walls
are all mirrors, what a mess
oh my God-
And still
it stands,
the question
not how begin
again, but rather
Why?
So we sit there
together
the mountain
and me, Li Po
said, until only the mountain
remains.
-from God’s Silence
